Forster's Tern at Arne RSPB With Honey Buzzard "Afters"

The first summer Forster's Tern at Arne in Dorset has been on my radar for quite some time now. What was presumably the same bird was first seen back in April at Bingham Reservoir in Somerset where it spent a few hours sitting on a buoy before flying off. It then turned up in the Poole Harbour area where it gave birders the run-around until the end of May without ever settling down to a predictable pattern of behaviour. Given how relatively low the odds of connecting were, I didn't bother trying for it at this time. After that it all went quiet for a while. However, towards the end of July it started being reported more regularly from one location in the Harbour to the point where I reckoned that it was pretty reliable. The only trouble was that I was rather busy at work. Therefore, it wasn't until this weekend that I finally found a window of opportunity to have a go at trying to see it.

The bird was being reported at Shipstal Point on the south side of Poole Harbour on the eastern edge of the RSPB reserve at Arne. Apparently it was roosting there with some Sandwich Terns each evening. The best times to see it were either first thing in the morning or last thing at night with the morning seemingly the most reliable. Now, these days sunrise it at around 5:45 am which would make for a pretty early start from Oxford. Therefore I decided to book an Air Bnb and to travel up the previous evening, ready for a dawn raid the next day. At the last minute I realised that at only 2.25 hours from Oxford, I could in fact head off at 4pm and be there in time for the evening roost thereby having two goes at seeing the bird, once for the evening roost and then for the next morning as well. So it was that I headed off at 4pm down the A34 into the tail end of Storm Antoni where I had to drive through very tricky torrential rain for a good part of the journey. Despite this, I made reasonable time and so it was that at around 6:15 pm I pulled into the almost deserted car park at Arne RSPB, donned all my waterproof gear just in case it rained again and partly to counteract the still very strong wind, and yomped off down the path to Shipstal Point. Just as I was heading off news came up on RBA of the bird still being present that evening. That sounded most promising! It was already there for the evening roost so it just had to stick around for the 20 minutes that it was going to take for me to walk down to the beach and, as long as it didn't disappear into an unobservable area, I should get to see it!

I arrived at the beach to find just three other birders there all seemingly looking at the bird and a hurried enquiry put my mind at ease. One obliging fellow birder first let me look through his scope for the tick and even set up my scope so that it was straight on the bird - who could ask for more? The reason for needing to do this was that it was currently tucked up asleep with it's head out of view and if you didn't know which one it was then it would have been pretty tricky to pick it out from the 50 odd Sandwich Terns all roosting there. However, every 5 minutes or so it would lift it's head up, have a bit of a stretch and then go back to sleep so that after a short period I started to get some reasonable views. After a while, it did then wake up a bit more and stood up, albeit partially obscured behind a Sandwich Tern, but I was at last able to take some photos of it. However, the sun was shining very brightly and quite low, lighting up these white birds so much that it threw out the exposure of my digiscoping efforts so my results were little more than record shots.

Looking towards to roost from the beach

A "context" photo with the Forster's in the centre of the photo

 

I took some video but the combination of the wind and the harsh lighting meant that it wasn't that great. 

...Having a stretch!

 

...and a couple of zoomed in shots

After about half an hour of watching it, something spooked the flock and about half the Terns suddenly flew up and left, including the Forster's. 

I was lucky enough to click the shutter just as it took off so managed to get this shot

I waited for a little longer to see if it would come back but it didn't while I was there. Still there were plenty of other birds to look at with a few Black-tailed Godwits, Curlew, Redshank, Dunlin, a Whimbrel and lots of Black-headed Gulls to sift through. All in all it was a very picturesque location and, having already seen my target, I was in a contented frame of mind . 

 

Looking towards Poole Harbour from the beach

Finally I decided to leave, and ambled back along the pleasant woodland path to the car. Then it was a quick 20 minute hop back to Wareham where my AirBnB was located. This turned out to be in a nice quiet location where I passed a pleasant evening eating, watching Netflix and getting to know my hosts' two lovely and inquisitive kittens. Finally I turned in for the night to sleep the deep and contented sleep of a twitcher who had already connected with their target.

My original plan for the next day had been to get there for first light but, having already connected, I decided that there was no need to push myself so instead decided to aim for a more leisurely 7am arrival at Arne. The weather was gorgeous this morning, bright sunshine and only a moderate breeze - such a contrast from yesterday! I arrived to find the car park much more full this morning with more carloads turning up as I was getting ready. I tooled up and headed off along the now familiar walk back to the beach. En route, RBA came up with "still present this morning until 6:20 am when flew off". Hmm, was I was going to pay the price for not getting here first thing? Still, with the pressure off from my connection yesterday I wasn't too bothered. When I arrived there was just a single lady birder there (from Chippenham as it turned out). Being there on her own she had no idea where to look so I explained about where the birds roosted though there were no birds there now. We both lamented the fact that it had been reported as having flown off already. There were plenty of the usual stuff around on the exposed mud flats but only a handful of Sandwich Terns on view loafing on buoys or poles. A Great White Egret on the waters edge was new from yesterday and there were generally more birds about. Quickly, other people started to arrive until there were at least a dozen people there - all somewhat disappointed with the lack of the target Tern.

About half an hour passed with nothing to show for it. An Osprey appeared over the pines on the island opposite us which offered some diversion for a while. Then suddenly our target turned up, hunting actively in the channel in front of us and flying back and forth. Looking into the light, it wasn't so easy to see but it was good enough to make out the bandit mask across the eyes even in flight and there was a palpable sense of relief amongst the assembled group. It had a noticably different jizz from the "angular" feel of a Sandwich Tern. It put on a good display for about 5 minutes as it hunted back and forth along the channel, diving regularly. At one stage we thought it was going to land on a buoy but the Sandwich Tern which was already there wasn't having any of that and chased it off. Eventually the Forster's heading off around the Point and out of sight. We all hurried to the Point and around the corner but couldn't see it. Having now seen it again this morning and with other plans for the morning I didn't feel the need to linger any longer so whilst the others hung around to get more views I opted instead to head back to the car.

The crowd trying to relocate the Tern after the initial sighting

My "other plans" were to stop off in the New Forest on the way home for some Honey Buzzard action - now an annual event in my birding calendar. It was a pleasant hour's drive to my usual location and so it was about 10 am that I wandered out along the familiar path to my usual raptor watch vantage point. On the way I listened out carefully and managed to hear the distinctive scolding call of a Dartford Warbler though I couldn't see it.

I had been hoping for some company during my visit. For the previous two years I'd been blessed with some expert companionship for at least part of my time there but on this occasion I was on my own. It was a very slow start and I did wonder if I might be wasting my time. Initially it was just a couple of Ravens and a lone Buzzard but after a while things seemed to get going with a whole succession of Buzzard sightings and a Sparrowhawk. Finally after a bit less then a hour a pair of Honey Buzzard came into view and I spent a very pleasant five minutes watching them as they circled in the sky for a bit before moving off. Once again I was struck by just how distinctive they looked when seen well. Their jizz was much more agile and "in control" compared to Common Buzzards which had a somewhat "lumbering" air about them by comparison. Also the relatively small head and longer tail of the Honeys meant that there was a "weight to the rear" vibe about them whereas there was more of a "front heavy" feel to Common Buzzard. Having seen my target well I decided to see if I could score an actual view of a Dartford but despite spending quite some time listening and looking I could not winkle one out. 

The birds were generally rather skulking but I did spot a distant family of Stonechats

Eventually I headed back to the car and set the Sat Nav for home. I had a final cup of tea from the flask and a bite to eat before the drive back to Oxford. I arrived back home early afternoon to bask in the warm contented glow of a very successful outing.

Twitcher's Supplement

For people who might be wanting twitching information for visiting the Forster's Tern themselves it's all fairly straight-forward. In the map below, park at the Arne RSPB car park, follow the red trail for "Shipstal" through the woods for about 20 minutes before taking the path down onto the beach. The birds roost along the yellow line and the Forster's was hunting in the channel marked in blue.

Drayton Night Heron

After all the excitement of the spring, county birding in June proved predictably boring and quiet. In contrast, the first Sunday in July certainly started off with a bang! I was sitting on the sofa, idly wondering what I was going to do with myself as the rest of my family were going out for the day and I was going to be left my own devices. “If only there was a bird” to see I said to myself. At that moment my custom notification alert on the county birding WhatsApp group went off: “Night Heron Peep-o-Day Lane, Drayton, roosting in tree with Little Egrets per TW". Of course those who read my recent blog post, don’t need to be told about the significance of a Night Heron in the county. After the excitement but then disappointment of the first bird in a long time, seen by single observer at Otmoor back in the spring only for it not to be seen again by the assembled crowd of keen twitchers, here was the possibility of a twitchable bird  The only trouble was that Night Herons are known to be quite skulking. As the name suggests, they generally feed at night and during the day they roost, often hidden away from view for hours at a time. There was not a moment to be lost! I quickly ran upstairs, got dressed, bundled all my birding kit into the car and sped off. I wanted to make sure that I got there while the bird was still in view in case it decided to move out of sight. 

It was a nerve wracking 30 minute journey down to Drayton but I made good time and as it turned out as I was only the third person to arrive. I needn’t have worried because the bird was on show and after a nervous glance through my binoculars I was able to get my tick and relax. After that it was a question of finding a best vantage spot for some more prolonged studying of this county rarity. In the end I had to view through a hedge which was good enough though not ideal. The bird was sitting in the base of a willow on the far side of a flooded pool some 75 yards from the path. I set up my scope as best I could and took some video footage. 

After that, it was a case of standing around chatting to fellow birders as they turned up, often letting them have a view through my scope to get their initial tick. As usual, in these situations, it ended up being quite a social affair with lots of chatting and banter amongst the now relaxed county birders who'd seen the bird well, punctuated periodically by the nervous "is it still there" from new arrivals. The bird proved very obliging stayed more or less in the same place all day, allowing some people who were at work or away to get back in time to get their tick so it was only people who were out of county who weren’t able to connect that day. For my part I spent about an hour and a half there, taking in this county rarity at my leisure and enjoying the company. Then I ambled back to the car and drove home to bask in the warm satisfying glow of a county tick.

I experimented with taking some photos through the scope on my hand-held iPhone and this one didn't come out too badly

There is a bit more to the story however. The bird was subsequently seen a few days later one morning at 5:30 a.m, by BC at the same pond but wasn’t subsequently seen that day, I did wonder whether the bird might be feeding there at night but roosting somewhere else out of sight during the day. However, there was no further news of the bird for a couple of weeks after that. Then one Thursday morning, the bird was reported again, roosting in the Willows right next to the footpath away from the pond. With nothing else to do, I decided I would go and pay another visit, hoping to get some better views. However, I arrived to meet RW who told me that the bird had just been flashed 30 seconds before my arrival by a dog walker and their over exuberant Labrador. Talk about unlucky! Fortunately, this was not a county tick so I wasn’t too disappointed though I had been rather looking forward to getting better views of this bird. 

TM who had been away up in Scotland when the bird was originally found, turned up on his bike. For him there was more at stake: this would be a county tick. The three of us spent the next hour or so peering into every nook and cranny of the willows. RW even had a thermal imaging camera to help him, but even with that we were unable to winkle the bird out. TM and I decided that we would just have one last walk up the footpath to see if we could find it before giving up. I wasn’t even bothering to look properly, but suddenly TM said:

“I can see it! I can see it! Yes! Yes! At last!”

“Where, where ?” I said.  

He tried to direct me through the thicket of of Willows, but try as I might I could not see where he was looking. Suddenly, the bird flew, and I got to see it as it disappeared into the vegetation once again. TM was elated and I was very pleased for him and also pleased that I’d at least got to see the bird again albeit only briefly in flight. We knew that where we'd just seen the bird had been well searched earlier so decided the bird must be still moving around. We wondered if maybe it was trying to feed still after heavy rain the previous night. We spent a bit longer looking for it again after that, but having already seen it there was less incentive and after while we gave up and headed back to our respective homes.

Scotland in June: Orchids & Odonata

My eldest daughter has been very good at generating excuses for some good birding trips over the years. As she is situated up in Durham this has given me some great opportunities for trips to Spurn, Northumberland and southern Scotland and my list of birds from these trips is rather impressive. Indeed it boasts things like Masked Shrike, White-winged Scoter, Black Scoter, Harlequin Duck, Blyth's Pipit, Citrine Wagtail, Pied Wheatear, Penduline Tit, Black-throated Thrush to name just some of the rarer birds. My younger daugher on the other hand hadn't really been pulling her weight in terms of providing me with decent bird trippage. As she'd been to Swansea as an undergraduate there hadn't been much on offer there apart from a few rare plants. Granted her Master's in Edinburgh had provided me with Eastern Black-eared Wheatear and Black Duck but she was still rather behind the offerings of the eldest. Now, however, she was due back up in Scotland this coming autumn to start another Masters course, this time at Aberdeen in Health Psychology. She had been thinking that it might be a good idea to go and have a look around this summer so she could have an idea about what to expect and as I quite fancied a trip up to Scotland myself I readily agreed. The basic plan was to spend a day travelling up, spend a day looking around Aberdeen, then spend some time in the Cairngorms area around Loch Garten before heading home via Durham where we had to drop off something for daughter 1. Naturally, June in Loch Garten offered up some interesting opportunities and I worked out that I should be able finally to get at least some of the northern orchid species on my list as well as trying to see some speciality nothern odonata. So, plenty enough for me to feel motivated for the trip.

We set off on Friday up the M6 towards Scotland. The M6 on a Friday is never a great day for travelling and there were periodic traffic stoppages though never anything too serious. We stopped off at our favourite service station at Tebay on the M6 just before Penrith. For those who are into such things, these services are ranked number two in the UK behind only Gloucester Services (which I've not yet been to). It was great to sit outside at a table eating an iced bun and drinking tea and listen to calling Curlew and Sisken - what's not to like! 

 

The view from the picnic table at Tebay services isn't too shabby!

 

We finally arrived at our overnight stopping location of Stirling in the early evening. After a nice meal we had a wander up to the castle on the hill where there were panoramic views over towards the distant hills.

Stirling Castle viewed from the church viewpoint

Looking west towards the mountains such as Ben Lomand, Ben Vorlich etc

 

The next morning we headed on the further two hours to Aberdeen. I've flown into the city airport in the past but had never actually been into the city at all so it was new for both of us. We passed a pleasant day wandering around the hosipital area where she will be doing her training and around the university campus. I hadn't appreciated just how old the university was but it was established in 1495 and had wonderful old buildings to match. 

Aberdeen University was surprisingly old

Towards late afternoon we were getting tired so we went to our guest house for the night to relax and order some takeaway. After that we decided to head out again to explore the beach that lies between the two rivers: the Dee to the south and the Don to the north. The beach turned out to be a lovely sandy affair with hardly any people around at this time of day. We soon spotted a pod of dolphins quite close in and spent our time tracking them as they made their way slowly north. My daughter took some video on my superzoom camera and I watched them in my scope. I also managed to see all four Tern species hunting actively along the shoreline. Apparently they nest on an island at the mouth of the river Don. Eventually it started to get dark so we headed back to our guesthouse and turned in for the night.

Some video taken by my daughter

The next day we headed off west on the two hour drive to the Loch Garten area. Fortunately, the weather forecast, which had looked a bit iffy a few days ago, was for reasonably sunny conditions with no rain which would mean that there should be no issues with the odonata side of our quests. Indeed this was where we started, with our first stop being the small pond on the approach road to Loch Garten from Boat of Garten. 

The "Northern Damselfly pond" near Boat of Garten

 

Most odonata enthusiasts will know this pond as the go-to place for my first target, Northern Damselfly. It didn't take too long to find either. Northern is know for skulking in amongst the vegetation at the edges of ponds so the boardwalk there is ideally place and there were several individuals on show most of the time. There were a few Common Blues about as well so one did have to be a bit careful but it was all fairly straight-forward. There were a few Large Red Damselflies also in amongst the sedge whilst across the water surface there were loads of Four-spotted Chasers.

Four-spotted Chasers were numerous

 

The main diagnostic points for identifying Northern Damselfly from Common Blue is that the S2 mark is in the form of a spear head rather than the round club that Common Blue has. Also, the lower half of the eyes on Northern are green. When viewed side on, there are two small black stripes on the side of the thorax compared to the single stripe of Common Blue. Note that whilst Azure Blue also has two black stripes, this species is not found in this area.

Northern Damselflies in cop

It was hard work getting the autofocus to lock on so I often had to resort to "over-zooming" right in so that the subject filled the frame, as above. You can see the spearhead black mark nicely on S2 here.

In this side on photo you can see the two small black lines on the side of the thorax as well as the green lower half of the eyes

Having quickly achieved my first target, it was time to move onto my next ones. These were a couple of northern orchids that should be in flower at the time, namely Coralroot Orchid and Lesser Twayblades. I'd been told that given how dry a spring it has been up in Scotland (it certainly was noticeably drier there than down south) that there weren't many orchids about this year. Fortunately I'd been given a secret location where both could be found (don't ask - I've been sworn to secrecy!). So it was back in the car and on to the woodland where they were known to be found. It was actually my daughter who first found both the Coralroot and the Lesser Twayblades. The former were dotted around in the more marshy places whereas the latter was only in one clump, marked by a stick. They looked rather thin in the dry conditions but at least I'd finally got to see them.

Above Coralroot and below Lesser Twayblades
both taken with my iPhone so the quality is not great

 

Having achieved all my targets already, we then discussed what to do for the afternoon. In the end we elected to have a picnic on the shores of Loch Morlich and then to walk along the trail around the loch. This was a walk that my daughter had done previously with her friends and which should take a couple of hours or so. Loch Morlich turned out to be the number one inland beach destination for Scotland with hoards of people all along the shoreline having picnics, paddling about and otherwise enjoying the hot sunny conditions. This was very much not my scene though as we continued along the trail we soon left the crowds behind us and it was quiet and peaceful. There was not much in the way of wildlife seen this afternoon apart from a Spotted Flycatcher feeding it's youngster and a calling Crested Tit in the canopy above us as we ate our picnic. It was also rather comical to watch a young family of Goosander hunting in the shallow river that flows out of the loch. The mother would see a fish and then forge through the shallow water in pursuit. As soon as she did this all the youngsters would immediately start doing the same though presumably without an actual fish in their sights. They caused quite a commotion!

The Goosander family learning to hunt

 

You can make out three young Spotted Flycatcher chicks in the nest

 

After our walk we headed back to Boat of Garten where we'd booked into a guesthouse for the evening. We chilled there for a while, then headed into Grantown where the old chinese takeaway was still going. This we ate along the river shoreline. Whereas when I'd visited there in the past I had had the whole place to myself, this time there were half a dozen campervans all parked up along the river. A sign of the times I guess as more people have more leisure time to spend. There was a large patch of Lupins and I managed to find a Chimney Sweeper moth in the tall grass - actually a personal lifer of what is not that rare a species. 

Chimney Sweeper moth skulking in the grass

 

Nootka Lupins growing by the river bank - a wild Lupin species rather than a
garden escape which can be found on shingle banks in Scotland

After dinner we headed to Loch Garten RSPB car park where we parked up and just spent some time chilling by the loch shore watching the sun go down. A calling Cuckoo was the only wildlife of note. Then it was back to the guest house where we collapsed on our beds, tired out after a long day.

We encountered quite a few of this Chickweed Wintergreen in various
forest  locations during our visit to the Loch Garten area

The next day we planned to head down to daughter 1 at Durham to stay the night there. However, the forecast torrential rain turned out not to be as bad as predicted so we decided to head over to the Uath Lochans nature reserve. This was a known hot spot for Northern Emeralds though in the windy and overcast conditions I wasn't holding my breath. The reserve turned out to be a lovely forest with four lochans to walk around on a simple, well-marked trail. There were no odonata over the water but it was very picturesque and we both greatly enjoyed our walk.

One of the four lochans - it was too cold and windy for any odonta to be on the wing

Then it was back in the car for the long slog down to Durham. That evening we went for a walk around the local area which in the lovely evening sunlight looked really beautiful. Normally Durham has this somewhat melancholy air to it so it was quite a revelation to see it looking so good. 

The final day was just a long slog back home to Oxford. The first part of the journey was through torrential rain that made driving conditions very tricky so it was hard work. However, by the time we got back to Oxford it was sunny, humid conditions again just as they had been when we had left. It had been a very nice, albeit rather tiring trip up to Scotland. Thanks to daughter 2's new course, I expect that this will be the first of many up there.

Amazing Spring Birding in Oxon

I have six different Oxon birding trips to write about here in what has been an amazing purple patch of spring county birding. I had been thinking that nationally it has been a bit quiet with just one sortie so far this year for the White-crowned Sparrow. So it's been great that the local scene has been more than making up for things.

 

1. Spotted Crake & Night Heron Overture

It all started a few weeks ago on the 29th April when a Spotted Crake was heard singing at Otmoor on Greenaways - the main field along the bridleway that runs east to west across the RSPB reserve. With my VLW and our two daughters away on a grand tour of asia I currently have lots of time on my hands. So I was thinking an evening stroll to Otmoor to take in all the sights and sounds of springtime would be a very pleasant way to pass the time. 

As it happened, this day coincided with a Big Day attempt by bike by BS and TM so they rocked up at Otmoor that evening, completely exhausted, to tick off the Spotted Crake at the end of their day. The Crake duly obliged by singing away as usual. I recorded it on my H4n Pro field recorder.

 

Adam Hartley 4 · Spotted Crake at Otmoor RSPB

There is a side story to this evening which is where it gets interesting. TM was cycling back along the turnoff to the first screen when he thought he saw what looked like a Night Heron through the gap in the hedge. He stopped at the next gap in the hedge but couldn't see it. Given it was twighlight and he was exhausted he it dismissed it from his mind. In fact he only told me all this a couple of days later (see the next section). Back at the Crake listening spot I was chatting away to the two of them while we listened to all the sounds around us. It's a magical time of year with Snipe drumming, reeling Grasshopper Warblers, in fact all the warblers warbling away, Cuckoos were calling and Cranes were trumpeting. It truly was a wonderful soundscape. 

Suddenly we heard a strange call.

"What's that" I asked

It called again.

"It's flying to the right" said TM

It called a total of four times and then that was it. For the combined collective experience of the three of us not to know the call must mean that it's something more unusual. Still with nothing to go and the excitment of the Big Day to dissect, we rather forgot about it.

 

2. Night Heron Vigil

The above conversation ws rather thrown into sharp focus a couple of days later when legendary county rare finder JD took a photo of a small heron flying over the reedbed at Otmoor. To his amazement it turned out to be a Night Heron. 

The Night Heron, courtesy of Jeremy Dexter

 

When the photos were posted on-line, naturally I thought to look up Night Heron call. Crickey, if that didn't sound exactly like what we had heard! I messaged TM and BS. Ben admitted to being too tired to remember what he'd heard but TM agreed that it did sound spot on. BS did say that we might find someone who had inadvertently picked it up on their Spotted Crake audio recording though so far nothing has been forthcoming.

That evening the good and the great of the county assembled at the reedbed of Otmoor to see if the Night Heron would put in another appearance. We passed a pleasant evening chatting and watching the Hobbies, Cranes and Marsh Harriers fly around and listening to the Bitterns booming. Sadly there was no repeat appearance of the Night Heron. 

The Oxon great and the good wating for the Night Heron, courtesy of Tom Bedford

I did get a stern lecture from one of the county birding seniors who told me I couldn't put Night Heron on my list on the basis of what I'd heard two nights ago. He went on to tell me how one time at dusk he had seen a small Heron in silhouette which had almost certainly been a Night Heron but he hadn't counted it. Therefore I shouldn't count my heard-only either!

In terms of whether I'm counting it or not, I've had a chat with TM. It wouldn't look good if only one of us counted it and he is a bit more conservative than me so for now it's not on my official published county list. However, I do keep a personal list which has various additions. By way of digression (but who doesn't love to chat about lists), I feel that the official record keeping bodies in the UK do a lamentable job. So my additions to my official list are:

Ruddy Shelduck: the flock of 9 birds at Blenheim was clearly part of the feral continental Cat C flock

Snow Goose: the Farmoor birds are self sustaining in my book as they've been around for years

Falcated Teal: the Farmoor bird was the wariest bird there and was part of an influx of carrier Mallard.

Red-breasted Goose: the two Otmoor birds, they were part of a general goose influx with appropriate carrier species

Great Bustard: a bit more controversial perhaps but at some point you've got to start counting release scheme birds and if you can't tell how many generations in it is, then you might as well start counting them immediately.

So the Night Heron has gone onto my private list as a worthy heard-only addition.

 

3. Otmoor Black-winged Stilt 

I rarely go to Otmoor. In fact I can pass whole birding years without visiting the reserve but I went for a third time in as many weeks when a Black-winged Stilt turned up there. This was not a county bird that I needed having seen one at Pit 60 back in April 2012 but they are always such good looking birds that it would be rude not to try for it. The only trouble was I only had a small window to see it between client therapy appointments. Still it seemed to be settled on Big Otmoor having returned after initially being seen for one evening only a few days prior. It had spent much of the morning there so it had to be worth a shot. Sadly I arrived to find everyone marching contentedly back along the bridleway which is never a good sign. 

At the Stilt location there was no sign of it. I didn't have too long free so frantically searched for it. A cryptic message came through on the county WhatsApp about it at the north end of "the scrape". Which scape? Big Otmoor is full of them! Anyway, I was saved at the eleventh hour by PL who called me to say that he had it further west towards Noke. I just had time to rush over there, take a terrible record shot and then head off home. Still it was nice to have seen another Black-winged Stilt in the county. I guess they are only going to get commoner as climate change continues.

A rubbish record shot of the Stilt

Some video footage courtesy of Badger

A great photo of the bird by Pete Milligan

4. Temminck's Stint

The Port Meadow regulars have been speculating about Temminck's Stint turning up on the Meadow in May. Sadly it wasn't to be (so far at least) but one did turn up one evening at Farmoor along the causeway. Again with nothing to do after dinner in the absence of my VLW I headed out to have a look. And very nice it was too! It's been a few years since I've seen one and this one gave excellent views. It was remarkable how birdless Farmoor was. Apart from the Stint on the causeway there was virtually nothing there. Sad times!

The Temminck's Stint was very obliging when being filmed

5. Montague's Harrier

The same evening as the Temminck's Stint had turned up, the Otmoor warden had seen a "probable" Montague's Harrier fly over the reedbed at Otmoor. Many of us had been around long enough to have seen Monty's when they bred in the county (sadly no longer). What had county listers nervous though was the possbility of it being a Pallid Harrier instead.  I really didn't fancy spending hours on Otmoor on the off chance of it flying through again so I was really hoping it was going to be a Monty's

The next morning it flew through Greenaways again, giving some great views and some great photos for those there. This confirmed it as a first summer Monty's so there was no need to panic. Still I found myself with a couple of hours spare between client therapy sessions so I decided to have a wander down there (a fourth visit to Otmoor this year already!!). There I passed a couple of pleasant hours not seeing much of anything and certainly not seeing a Monty's but enjoying watching the Hobbies fly about in the sunshine. It wasn't seen again that day.

A great photo of the Monty's courtesy of Joe Downing

6. Golden Oriole

I was just getting back to the car at Otmoor when MC posting an amazing video of a Golden Oriole singing out of sight in the middle of nowhere near Witney. 

Singing Golden Oriole courtesy of Mick Cunningham

He'd just stopped to relieve himself by the roadside and happened to have stumbled on a singing Oriole - what are the chances!!?? This put me in a bit of a dilemma. I'd already been out birding today and I had a client session this afternoon which often went on for a long time for this client. I also had a meal to cook this evening which was going to take a bit of time. I could cancel my client session but the Oriole seemed a bit vague and uncertain. After some deliberation I decided not to rush off to Witney. In the end it turned out that had I gone I would have heard the bird (which sang regularly) and would have got a brief flight view. Gah! That was birding though. However, access was very limited and had subsequently been withdrawn altogether so it was a difficult call whether still to try for it or not.

After thinking about it, I decided to postpone my more elaborate meal plan and just to serve up some pizza instead for my son and I. After dinner I would head down to see if I could at least hear it which would be a heard-only county tick for me. After all, for a Golden Oriole, that was probably the best that one could reasonably hope for anyway. I duly turned up at a little after 7pm, parked on the verge with a few other cars and then walked a couple of hundred yards down the road to where four other county birders were. It turned out that there had been no sight nor sound of it since about 4:30 pm so it wasn't looking good. Still it was a nice evening and we all started chatting about birding matters. It was no more than five minutes since I'd arrived however when we heard the distinctive flutey call of the Golden Oriole singing a few hundred yards away but on the opposite side of the road from where we were expecting it. I'd actually got to hear it! I couldn't believe my luck!

We all hurried back up the road near to where I had parked. Here there was a gap in the hedge were we could stand in the edge of the field and listen. It was singing nearly continuously and we managed to narrow it down to a lone Oak tree on the opposite side of the field. So we had all heard it and with it pinned down in the tree there was a chance we would get a flight view at some point. We all listened and enjoyed the singing Oriole as a few more birders turned up. Only SNT had his scope out. The rest of us thought it was a thankless task to try and see an Oriole in the tree at that distance - after all they are skulky bastards at the best of times. Suddenly SNT announced that he had it in the tree! Holy crap! Sure enough as he let each of us view it through his scope, there it was. I hurried back to the car and retrieved my scope. Fortunately the bird seemed settled in the one location and I was soon able to get on it and take some video footage.

Actual video footage of an Oxon Golden Oriole! Who would have thought it?

It spent quite some time just sitting there and singing, in fact "porning it" by Golden Oriole standards! Eventually it got a bit restless and moved from its spot. Then it suddenly took flight and flew across the field towards us and back over the road to the trees on the other side. This was our cue to leave and we all headed off, very happy to have got such a great county tick. To be honest, this was one that I didn't think I would ever get so it was amazingly good fortune that it all worked out as well as it did. Also, in hindsight, waiting until after dinner had actually turned out to be the best option.

So that concludes an amazing sequence of half a dozen great county birds. I never saw the Monty's but the others I either saw or at least heard (in my book at least!). Living in an inland county such as Oxon is often a thankless task on the birding front but when it does go well, it is all the sweeter for it!

Seaford White-crowned Sparrow

Last Saturday (the 22nd) a Mega grade rarity in the form of a White-crowned Sparrow was found in East Sussex at Seaford. This immediately piqued my interest as it was something that I "needed" for the UK and it was also well within my self-imposed driving range limit for going on a twitch. It also brought back fond memories of my twitch to the White-throated Sparrow nearby at Barcombe Cross back in April 2021. That bird was fairly reliable, turning up every forty minutes or so to feed on seed that had been put out for it. This bird on the other hand was being reported as very elusive and I had no appetite to go and spend all day search the dense undergrowth in the hope of getting lucky. Rather, I like my twitches to have a high chance of success. 

For this bird, I did wonder if locals there were going to resort to seed in order to try to improve the reliability and sure enough on Thursday it started to be reported regularly as "coming to seed" and "showing well". This was more like it! I did contemplate going for it on Friday but I had a therapy client that afternoon and didn't want to put myself under too much pressure so in the end I decided to go on Saturday. However, this was going to be the first weekend of it showing well so there would be hoards of people all with the same idea. So, I decided that I would have to be there uncharacteristically early for me at dawn. As I'm really not a "get up in the middle of the night to drive to a twitch" kind of person, at the last minute I booked an AirBnB in Seaford and headed off straight after dinner on Friday evening. The journey there was uneventful and I turned up at my lodgings for the night shortly after 10pm. After a brief unwind from the journey I was in bed by 11pm, ready to spring into action at first light tomorrow.

I had set an alarm for 5am but in the event I woke up at some time around 4:30am and decided to get up and press on. So it was that a little after 5:30am I rocked up at the car park, pleased to find that there were only 10 other cars there before me. It was very pleasant getting tooled up and heading off in the early light of dawn. There were birds singing all around and it was very peaceful and beautiful. I said to myself that I really must get up at sunrise more often: it's such a beautiful time of day!

Dawn at Seaford Head

After a 10 minute walk down to Hope Gap I soon came across the twitch arena. This was a gap between two extensive clumps of scrub into which a dozen or so birders were crammed, all peering intently up the gentle slope to a seeded area less than 20 yards away. There was just room for me to slot into the small crown and get a reasonable view of what was going on. After a quick enquiry I was informed that the bird had been seen this morning so it all should be straight-forward. And indeed within about 5 minutes I had had my first glimpse of it skulking around. The basic pattern was that it was coming to the seed every 20 minutes or so. It would initially perch in the surrounding bushes, where it would give its best views, before dropping down to feed on the ground where it was usually partially obscured by the various plants that were growing there. I remembered last summer in Canada seeing this species in a variety of different urban and parkland locations in Vancouver - it was good to see it again, albeit in very different circumstances. Anyway, the bird here was obliging enough and over a number of its visits to the seeded area I managed to get some reasonable video footage of it. 

 

A compilation of my best bits of video footage

The twitch arena - the bird would appear in the scrub in the centre of the picture

 

While waiting for it to put in an appearance, it was a pleasure to listen to the various other birds singing all around us. There was a close-by Cetti's, a number of Whitethroats and a Willow Warbler or two. Blackcaps and Chiffchaffs were also around as well as a variety of thrushes and finches. It's such a wonderful time of year where we can enjoy all the bird song! As people had had their fill and left, so one was able to be promoted up the twitch line and I was able to get marginally better views. However, my fears about the crowds proved justified. More and more people turned up and found themselves stuck at the back of the crowd, not really able to see at all. By the time I left the dozen or so people at the start had swollen to getting on for 50 - I was glad to be out of there by that stage! 

Twitchers crammed in the gap. This was before numbers got too large

I decided to have a wander down to the end of the little valley to take a look at the sea. Away from the crowds it was a lovely bit of habitat filled with various singing warblers. Down by the sea itself there were some Fulmars soaring around the chalk cliffs and a Rock Pipit and a Curlew on the shoreline. A quick sea watch in the company of a couple of other post-twitch visitors revealed some passing Common Scoter, a few Sandwich Terns and some Gannets. The sound of the sea was very relaxing and I spent quite some time just relaxing and listening to it.

The sea from the bottom of Hope Gap

 

Eventually it was time to head back home. As I passed the twitch site again there were now so many people that some were reduced to trying to scope the Sparrow from back on the main path. I thanked my stars that I'd decided to come at first light. I headed back to the car park which was now absolutely heaving. There I detooled and fired up the Gnome-mobile for the drive back home. The Saturday traffic was busy but I arrived back home late morning for a welcome celebratory cup of tea. It had been a very successful twitch.

As a footnote, that was the last day the bird was seen. Thankfully I didn't decide to go on Sunday instead as that would have been most gutting! There is something rather satisfying about seeing a bird on the last day. Somehow much better than seeing one early on which then goes on to stay for months. Either way, it was good to get my first national list tick of the year after my nasty dip at the start of the month.

Oxfordshire Giant Orchids & a Durham Dip

I've got a bit behind with my Gnome blogging as this actually happened back in March. In order to catch up I've also combined it with a low key trip up to Durham.

It just shows how out of the orchid loop I am that the first I heard about the Oxfordshire Giant Orchids (which must surely be common knowledge by now) was through reading about them on EU's blog. To be honest, I didn't even know that Giant Orchid was "a thing" as I'm not really a hardcore enthusiast. Still I do keep and work on a British orchid list and here was something to go and see at a time when it was generally rather quiet so it would be rude not to go. I therefore arranged to meet up with EU at the undisclosed location one morning as he was keen to go back for another visit. I arrived to find PL and a friend of EU's also in tow so the four of us duly set off on a leisurely 10 minute stroll to the orchid site.

I'd been warned to bring along a stick as the orchids were sited on a very steep bank. This turned out to be no exaggeration - it was remarkably steep! There was one obvious large plant quite close to the path so we all started by admiring that one.

The largest Giant Orchid specimen - you can get a sense of the steepness of the bank from this shot!

The same plant from a less "artistic" angle

 

After that I went off to rumage around and see how many others I could find. It was hard work negotiating the steep and treacherous slope and I was thankful that I'd brought a sturdy stick with me. After much searching the final tally was 4 blooms and 5 rosettes in total, all much smaller than the large first one we'd been admiring.

 

The other blooms were smaller and less spectacular than the largest one. This is a typical example

Apparently the orchids were first found last year by a local and were the first for Britain. They are fairly common on the continent where they can grown up to a metre tall but the largest one here was a fraction of that size. They are very early flowering for the orchid family and normally finish flowering by the end of March though these one were just getting underway so were late this year. It was good to get another orchid tick under my belt that was so close to home! Let's hope that they flourish in their new found home.

 

Durham Dipping

I also want to blog about a recent trip up to Durham to fetch my eldest daughter back for Easter. She wanted me to bring the car in order to take some of her stuff back. She's been living there in the same house for a couple of years and has now accumulated more than one car journey's worth of stuff which she's going to need to bring home at some point.

Having cast around for something to twitch, the obvious candidate was the long-staying Richardson's Cackling Goose what was about half an hour away from Durham. It had been frequenting the same field for a couple of weeks and looked pretty nailed down. The only trouble was that it was now April, the time when Pink-footed Geese (the carrier species in this case) think about departing. So it was a nervous wait in the days leading up to my trip. Still the day before my journey it was still there. Surely it could hang on one more day, couldn't it?

The short answer is that, no, it couldn't. The day of my trip coincided with a sudden change in the weather which warmed up and the chilly prevailing northerly winds finally abating. Of course the geese took the opportunity to head off overnight with this change in conditions and there was not a single goose to be found at all. I failed to find any on the day of my trip up to Durham and even checked again the next day but all to no avail. 

Instead, with there having been a general clear-out of all birding interest in the area there was not much compensatory birdage to be had at all. Accordingly, I decided to explore some of the Northumberland sea locations that I'd long read about in RBA news alerts but had never actually visited. So on the first day I went to Seaton Sluice and had a wander about. The second day I went to St. Mary's Island and had a pootle around there. It was nice seeing these locations in the lovely sunny weather and I made the best of it though, if I'm honest, this dip still really smarts as I write this. But that's birding I suppose.

Anyway, below are some photos from the trip.

Seaton Sluice

Spring Starflower growing on the clifftop at Seaton Sluice

Seaton Sluice Eider

Drake Mandarin on the River Wear in Durham

St. Mary's Island

Distant & blurry Purple Sandpipers at St. Mary's Island

So that's twice now I've dipped Richard's Cackling Goose. I dare say I'll eventually catch up with it but it is fast being elevated to the status of bogey bird. 

It seems that my eldest daughter might stay up in the North East to do a post doc which will mean a few more years of visiting the area. Hopefully this will mean some more good birds as well.