Yet Another Oxon Mega: Farmoor Twite!

In my last blog post I wondered whether there might be yet another rarity in Oxfordshire before the year was out. That thought has turned out to be rather prescient as indeed there has been some further top drawer Oxon birding action just in the last week. What's more the county rare bird finding machine that is JD has struck not just once but in fact twice in the space of 24 hours. What a year he's having!

It all started on Wednesday when mid-afternoon JD reported a Pectoral Sandpiper on Pit 60 from the Langley Hide. You may remember (see here) that this is the same site where he found the wonderful Marsh Sandpiper a couple of months earlier.  As I had already seen several Pectoral Sandpipers in the county, on my own Port Meadow patch no less, I was not desperate to see this bird and didn’t bother to drop everything and go when the news broke. A few keen birders did do so and managed to get some pretty decent views of it. Still I was interested enough that the next morning I got up early to rendezvous with JC and CM at the site. However, despite our best efforts it was nowhere to be seen and must have moved on in the night. There were a noteworthy 20+ Great White Egrets there which is an amazing count for Oxon though not really sufficient compensation. Somewhat disappointed with the lack of Pec Sand, I headed back home and got on with my day

However, JD struck yet again that day. I was midway through a client session at the time and made the mistake of checking a WhatsApp message during the session when news broke that he’d only gone and found a couple of Twite at Farmoor Reservoir. Total inner turmoil on my part as this was a real county Mega with the last definite county sighting being three birds briefly on the causeway at Farmoor way back in 2007. It was certainly a much needed county rarity for my list. I then had to sweat it out for another half an hour, trying to give my client my undivided attention before the session came to a natural end. At that point I grabbed my gear, bundled into the Gnome-mobile and headed off to Farmoor as fast as I could. This turned out to be not very fast at all. It was prime rush hour with loads of people all leaving Oxford at the same time. Every red light was against me and the traffic was heavy on the A34. There were even road works just before Farmoor village itself. Such torment! I finally pulled up in the car park at Farmoor and raced up the slope towards the causeway. I’d decided to travel light with just my bins and superzoom camera and my running shoes rather than my usual walking boots. I half ran, half walked along the causeway into a really strong headwind towards the far end. In this distance I could see a small handful of birders half way along the west shore of F1 (the smaller of the two reservoirs), hopefully still watching the pair of Twite. 

As I got within 100 yards they seemed to be start dispersing.

"Oh no! Had the birds gone???" 

My heart started to sink as they seemed to be packing up. This was the worse possible outcome of all: missing the birds by a matter of literally minutes. I could not believe it! With resignation I finally got close enough to ask what was happening. The birds had apparently just flown though not that far and had come down again about 100 yards further west along the path. 

"Was there yet hope yet???"

I made my tentative way along the path with a couple of other birders seeing if we could relocate them. Fortunately one of my companions spotted them roughly where he'd seen him come down feeding away on the margins just where the the grass was overhanging the tarmaced path. At last I got my first glimpse of this county mega and I could start to relax and actually enjoy them.

The two Twite, taken earlier in the day in brighter conditions courtesy of Jeremy Dexter

 

I say enjoy them but the light was appalling, it was windy as anything and it was starting to rain heavily. The birds were quite mobile as well: moving around back and forth across the path and into the longer grass poking the head up occasionally. I tried to take some photos though given all this it was hard work. After about 10 minutes they flew a short distance again and seemed to come down on the actual reservoir shoreline rather than on the path. After a bit of searching we managed to find them though they were tucked up right under the wavewall feeding away in a clump of daisies and it was hard to get clear views. More people turned up including Oxon Big Year lister CM with his two kids in their push chair. It reminded me of times in the past when I'd dragged my son L around to see various birds. I remember taking him to Farmoor to see a Bonaparte's Gull where he fell over and bumped his head, and also dragging a heavy push chair across the bog that is the Pill on Otmoor in the vain search for a Richard's Pipit. Happy memories!

Above and below, courtesy of Ewan Urquhart

 

Suddenly the birds flew off somewhere and nobody saw what direction they went. At that moment BS, the current Oxon Big Year leader turned up, having been stuck in traffic. Was he going to dip? The Oxon Big Year has been a very interesting contest to follow from the sidelines. I had done one way back in the day with JC and TW when JC broke the county record with 199 (+American Black Tern subspecies). I finished second with a creditable 197 (+ABT). Having done one I'd vowed never again and so was just enjoying the contest from the sidelines. BS was sitting on 190 (with a few things counted that we didn't back then) but needed his Twite. There was a bit of scratching of heads trying to work out where they'd gone. I told the group that the people who'd "handed over" to me when I'd arrived had mentioned that the birds had come back three times to the same spot, about 100 yards along the west shore so I suggested we head back there. As was started to walk that way news popped up on the WhatsApp channel that they were indeed back there. We all hurried over there and had another good look at them as they skulked about in the margins and BS managed to get his year tick.

I've included decent photos of the birds taken earlier on by better photographers with better equipment but this shows the reality of the situation. Drenched birders in gloomy half light watching tiny brown birds in amongst the thick grass!

 

By this stage I was started to get wet and cold and my camera lens was covered in rain. It was definitely time to head back. I hurried back at a brisk walk in the company of BS. I couldn't help but think how the mad dash in the appalling weather had made for a thoroughly enjoyable and dramatic twitch. Of course I could afford to think this given I'd manage to connect and, had I dipped, I might have felt very differently. But, after all the drama and tension, I had the warm glow of a great county tick - one that I didn't ever think I'd get given how rare they are. Back in the car park I cranked the heating on to warm up a bit and to dry out. Then it was back into the maelstrom of the rush hour and back home to Casa Gnome for a well deserved cup of reviving tea.  

Another from the finder Jeremy Dexter

 

As a footnote, it's worth just mentioning JD's amazing run of top draw county finds this year: Marsh Sandpiper, Bluethroat, Pectoral Sandpiper and Twite as well as a bonus Wood Warbler in the spring. What a year he is having and what a vintage county year this is turning out to be with Savi's Warbler and Red-footed Falcon being additional top county birds. I've had four county ticks this year already. Dare I hope for one more before the year is out? You never know!

Autumn Magic: Otmoor Bluethroat

What a vintage year this is turning out to be for Oxon. Usually as a land-locked county about as far as one can get from the sea we have to be content with picking up scraps of the occasional rarities and it's easily possible to go a whole year without any sniff of a county tick. However, this year we've already had Red-footed Falcon, Savi's Warbler, Marsh Sandpiper and Manx Shearwater and even a Honey Buzzard that was twitched by a few dedicated county birders. Surely there couldn't be any more this year? Well, it turned out that there was more to come. 

There was a certain sense of dejá vu to proceedings when county rarity finding machine JD messaged the local WhatsApp group to say that he thought he had a Bluethroat at the second screen at Otmoor. He was the same finder who initiated the last major twitch with the the Standlake Marsh Sandpiper. Once again, this wasn't twitchable on the day it was found, with only half an hour of daylight left once the ID had been firmed up . With it taking getting on for an hour from door to the second screen once the long 1.5 mile walk was factored in, there was no point in dropping everything so myself, no doubt along with the great and the good of the county, all feverishly started making our plans for the next day. Personally I had no meetings to worry about for the next morning so planned to be there at first light. 

Thus it was that I was up at the ungoldly hour of 5:20 a.m. and driving through the dark deserted streets of Oxford on the twenty minute journey to the car park at Otmoor. Here I found half a dozen other cars all parked up and other twitchers getting ready in the darkness. I found myself in the company of SM as we walked quickly along the paths in the darkness before eventually arriving at the second screen - about as far from the car park on the reserve as it's possible to get. There were about half a dozen others already there and in the half light I found a spot to set up my scope and join in the vigil. 

The view from the second screen looking towards the distant reedbed

We were looking out onto a pool of water surrounded on three sides by reeds. Last night JD had reported that it had been seen on and off in one particular area of the reedbed, working its way in and out of the base of the reeds. Now this species is notorious for often being really tricky to see with it's preferred reedbed habitat often making viewing extremely difficult. However, JD's account of it being seen regularly was reassurring. So it was just a question of whether it was still there. We were about to find out.

In the dawn gloom it was hard to make much out but we all peered intently at the base of the reeds, trying to find our target bird. The distances weren't helpful, with it being at least 100 yards to the back of the pool and it wasn't easy to make much out in the murk. Some 30 minutes or so passed and the crowd was just starting to get a bit restless when eagled eyed Uber Birder TM announced that he thought he had it right at the back. The trouble was that there were so few landmarks and we all scrambled to get on it. Things like "behind the cluster of white feathers", "next to the sleeping Snipe", "working it's way left" were bandied about as we all did our best. Eventually I was able to get on it, just making out its pale breast as it moved surprisingly rapidly amongst the reeds and along the shore. With confirmation from a second person, news was put out and soon after everyone else managed to get on it. Even with multiple directions it was often difficult to connect and there were times when I couldn't see it despite the person right next to me being on it and giving directions. Gradually however, it worked it's way left and nearer and as the light got better we all started to get better views. After showing regularly from about 7:10 a.m. onwards, at about 7:40 a.m. it worked it's way right into the corner where there was a  hidden channel that couldn't be viewed.

 

 

Video courtesy of Jason Coppock 

 

Photo courtesy of Gareth Cashburn

 

Happy Oxon birders, having seen the Bluethroat!

As a first winter male, this bird didn't have its blue throat yet so it wasn't possible to pin it down to subspecies. In fact, after reading up on it more, there are more than just the White-spotted and Red-spotted subspecies as it's a fairly widely distributed chat.  Indeed it can be found right across Europe and Asia and even has a foothold in Western Alaska. It is migratory and winters in the Iberian Peninsula, the northern half of Africa and also southern Asia. Whilst this bird was clearly a bit lost, with climate change we can no doubt start to expect more Bluethroats in the years to come. After all, the Slimbridge bird had now been visiting for the last five years.

Photo courtesy of Nick Truby

While waiting for the return of the star bird, there were a other few bits and pieces around to look at. A Water Rail was right out in the open and a Great White Egret was feeding in the pool along with a few Little Egrets and a Grey Heron. There were a few Teal, Gadwall and Mallards on the water, a couple of Kingfishers buzzing around, a Ringed Plover on the island in front of the hide and a Marsh Harrier sitting in a tree at the back. It was all very agreeable. 

 

Photo, taken the next day by Richard Stevens

More people started to arrive though to be honest I was somewhat surprised that there hadn't been more at first light. TM left first - it was literally his last day in Oxford (what a wonderful parting gift!) and he had to get on with moving out. With the bird not having been seen for about half an hour and, starting to feel rather tired after my early start, I decided to head back home soon after. I ambled contentedly back along the paths, enjoying the autumnal hedgerow scenery before eventually getting back to the car and heading back to Casa Gnome via Summertown for some shopping. 

The bird eventually reappeared and showed on and off throughout the day. Indeed, at the time of writing this, it was still around the following day. I wonder how long it might end up staying? In any event it was yet another a great county bird this year. Could there possibly be even more before the year is out? Given events so far one can't rule it out!