Ping! Ping!

Virtually the first birds we saw on Tuesday am were also the best birds we had seen on a Tuesday for some time.  Initially, there was a 'ping-ping' sound and then 8 small birds with long tails flew up vertically in a southerly direction, but then they turned and headed north over our heads & headed back deeper into cover in the reedbed.  That may have been all on an other occasion, but only a few seconds later we heard some more pinging and then we found first a moustachioed male shinning up a reed to take a look at us, followed by a female.  The wind was quite strong and they were being buffeted by the reeds, but everyone got good views of the pair.

Bearded Tit in Full Cry

 8 Beardies - a -flying (c) 2013 Maggie Bruce

 A Pair in the Reeds is Worth None in the Hand

 Bearded Tit (c) 2013 Chris Cox

 Bearded Tit (c) 2013 Maggie Bruce

 There were quite a lot of birds in the air including a single Green Sandpiper, and a small flock of Ruff, but further off there were literally hundreds of Golden Plovers swirling around in tandem with some Lapwings.  They may have been flushed by a single Marsh Harrier.  The water levels were exceptionally high, so it must a been a very high tide.  The Otter prints were under water, and because of the very cloudy water there was no sign of the Kingfisher.

Black-tailed Godwit

 ditto

 Immature Heron (c) 2013 Chris Cox

 Assorted Ruff & Dunlin (c) 2013 Maggie Bruce

 Ruff

 Ruff

 ditto

On the way back Chris spotted and identified a male Stonechat.  This may have been the first we have seen all year, it was certainly the smartest male we had observed for a very long time.

Stonechat

  ditto

  ditto

 Curlew (c) 2013 Chris Cox

 Immature Peregrine

Immature Peregrine

In the afternoon we were amazed by a dogfight between a Peregrine and a Sparrowhawk.  Later we found an exhausted Peregrine perched in a dead tree.  It was an immature bird, and it kept craning its neck to watch us, but it looked a bit thin & scraggy, so it may not be finding enough food to survive.  In Ken's telescope we could see the white fringes to its feathers and some brown colouring, which showed it was a young individual.  Another new bird in the afternoon was a Jay.  The Stonechat was still present & allowed me to get fairly close.

Walk Like an Egyptian

I'm afraid the text I wrote during my lunch hour on Friday has disappeared into the ether.  I can no longer remember what I wrote or saw that day.  The day can't have been especially memorable, so the pictures taken on that very grey day will have to suffice.  

Egyptian Goose

 Egyptian Geese

Common Darter 

 Great Crested Grebe

Immature Little Grebe

 Moulting Adult Little Grebe

Moulting Drake Pintail front with Shovelers Behind

 Meadow Brown (very late)

 A Scene from the Film Version of LOTR

Variety is the Spice of Life

After the fierce Spurn winds it was very calm on Thursday at Blacktoft.  We went to Marshland, and what a good decision that turned out to be.  The light was perfect and after a few minutes some waders began to move towards the hide.  A single Greenshank was one of the star birds, coming the closest we've ever had in a decade of viewing.  It was only afterwards that I realised that this was the nearest I've ever been to a Greenshank.  Closely was a male Ruff, and a variety of juveniles.  There were at least 3 Black-tailed Godwits and a few scattered Redshank.  Further behind was a flock of Dunlin, and on the same marsh were a few scattered distant Snipe.  The Lapwing looked very colourful in the early morning sunshine, and there were also a couple of Shoveler and some Teal still in eclipse.  However, this idyll wasn't to last because a young female Sparrowhawk made an abortive effort to catch a Stock Dove.  The dove flew across the water with the Sparrowhawk in tow, and this sent up all the waders.  They went, and never returned while we waited.  

Greenshank

 Juvenile Ruff (left) & Greenshank

 Male Ruff

 Male Ruff

 Male Ruff

 Black-tailed Godwit

 Lapwing

 Dunlin

 Lapwing & Dunlin

 Redshank

 Dunlin & Ruff

 Ditto

 Sparrowhawk

At Xerox there were a few Ruff, but the site was dominated by Teal, and Shoveler, which seem to be nearly out of eclipse.  Later, the Sparrowhawk turned up again & it had quite a dog-fight with a Carrion Crow.

Then we made the long walk to Singleton, but this had dried up so there was very little to see here.  We did spot a distant, soaring Marsh Harrier, and a charm of Goldfinches were demolishing the thistles right in front of us, but there was relatively little to see, although some members convinced themselves they had seen a Water Rail.

Townend wasn't much better with a distant Greenshank, and a slightly less distant Black tailed Godwit and 2 Redshanks.  A Buzzard was seen being mobbed by crows.

First hide was a waste of time, as was Ousefleet, but we did see some Canada & Greylag geese grazing on the way there.  A shelduck flew past, and it later dropped in to Marshland.  We had almost reached the visitor centre when suddenly the gabbling of geese was heard, and looking up we spotted several skeins of geese heading east following the course of the river.  

In the afternoon the waders weren't so plentiful or so close as the morning, but new species seen included: Kingfisher, Marsh Harrier, Water Rail, but still no Bearded Tit. 

Long-tailed Tit

 Hairy Caterpillar 

 Toad

Piling on the Wind

The wind was horrendous at Spurn on Wednesday, so there was no ringing to observe.  We walked around the Kilnsea area instead.  In the hedgerow we glimpsed the rufous tail of a Redstart on a couple of occasion, but we couldn't get on to the bird.  The Crown and Anchor car park yielded first a female and then a male Blackcap.  Then we could hear high-pitched calls around us, and we found a Goldcrest.  As usual with this species it was quite confiding.

Moulting Male Redstart similar to the one found by Eileen

 Gokldcrest (c) 2013 Tony Robinson

 Record shot of Spotted Flycatcher (c) 2013 Tony Robinson

 Record shot of Redstart (c) 2013 Tony Robinson

 Redstart & Lesser Whitethroat

We crossed the road to the edge of the river, and all but one of us managed to dodge the numerous piles of dog mess.  There were 2 very confiding Dunlin looking for food on the mudflats with Redshank further away, a single Curlew and a few Ringed Plovers.  Then someone noticed a Spotted Flycatcher in the garden of the large house on the seashore.  It posed well and went on several violent insect hunting sorties before returning to its favourite artificial perch.  A few minutes later a young Restart was seen, and this was observed for several minutes as it too hunted for its insect prey.  A Yellow-Browed Warbler may have been heard briefly on the return to the car park, but that was all.  

Firecrest (c) 2013 Tony Robinson

 ditto

 Jack Snipe

 ditto

 Meadow Pipit

Some of the morning contingent remained and managed to photograph a Firecrest and a Jack Snipe.  The afternoon group in addition to the morning birds saw a Lesser Whitethroat, 2 Jack Snipes and a Ring Ouzel.  It was a red-letter day for Carol who soon gave the maximum score, and that was before we saw the Jack Snipe & the Ring Ouzel.