Hudsonian Whimbrel

I am not keen on Twitches but when a Mega turns up in your patch you don't really want to miss out on it. So today I picked up Dave and we headed off to Pagham Harbour in the hope of seeing the reported Hudsonian Whimbrel before the big crowds started to turn up.

We decided not to risk the Church Norton car park and instead parked up near the visitors centre and walked down the side of the harbour to the hide. You might get in the car park but if the crowds turned up you wouldn't get out.

You always have your doubts when something like this is reported but it was the genuine article and all credit to George Kinnard who found and identified it.

Apologies for my pictures, the bird was a bit distant when we got there and gradually moved further away as the tide came in.

Hudsonian Whimbrel

Paler head with more distinctive marking

The head is paler than the Eurasian Whimbrel with stronger contrast between the almost white  supercillium and the very dark head and eye stripes.

Underwing appears to be a light brown with distinct barring. The Eurasian would be a white base colour.

No white cigar shape on the back

All brown back

The key identifiers are the lack of a white rump or cigar shaped white mark on the  Hudsonian Whimbrel's back. Slight variations in size and colour are harder to spot unless it is standing alongside an Eurasian bird.


There was not much else about but on the way back to the visitors centre we stopped to photograph a pair of Great Crested Grebes that were out on the Long Pool with their two young. In the early days the chicks sit nestled on the mothers back under the protection of her feathers whilst the male collects food and feeds them.

Father brings food

Safe under their mothers protection

A great afternoons birding. The Twitch wasn't too big and it was nice to meet up with a few old faces. It would be great to go back and get some better pictures but I think that it will be a few days before it quietens down a bit.

Dartford Warblers and Others

The birding is proving to be hard work at the moment. The end of June through to early August is always slow. There is no migration movement, there is plenty of cover for the birds to hide in, and the birds are not displaying for territory or mates as they were a month ago. This summer seems worse than ever and my own experience would seem to suggest that a lot of the birds have simply not arrived this year.

I commented in a previous post on how I had only seen two Stonechats so far this year. Like buses the next time I went out I saw at least eight in the same location on Iping Common.

Male Stonechat

Juvenile Stonechat

Hoping for a repeat performance - I have only seen one Redstart and have not seen a Spotted Flycatcher at all. If I could also add Turtle Dove to that list I could be a happy man after my next trip out.

I would have added Dartford Warbler to that list but I did manage to catch up with a pair on one of the commons. I had caught a couple of fleeting glimpses at the same location but did not feel that it was good enough for my year tick particularly as on both occasions the birds did not reappear. Fortunately on a recent early evening visit I was able to watch the pair gathering food for about half an hour. I kept my distance and with poor lighting the picture opportunities were limited. The shot below rescued by heavy cropping and from strong back lighting was the best I could manage.

Another almost picture - One in the bush and one flying

I also visited Warnham LNR. There was nothing unusual about in the way of avian life but I had some really weird lighting conditions. All my pictures appeared to have a colour cast but when you look at them they have both green and magenta in the same picture. This cannot happen as they are opposite ends of the spectrum (as far as Photoshop is concerned) and anyway the whites look clean. Even when desaturated as in the second picture the colours look wrong. Marvellous things the eyes, the scenes all looked perfectly normal to me on the day.

Great Crested Grebe

Young Grey Heron

This young Grey Heron looks like a nice friendly bird, not like the older version below, a true predator.

Grey Heron - Pagham North Wall

Also at the North Wall a Common Tern but not much else.

Common Tern

I did walk down to the lagoon to see the Female Scaup that had been reported there but I seem to have picked the one day when there were no sightings.

Actually there was one other sighting. The local police checking out the north wall, the lagoon, and the spit, and challenging one suspicious individual out on the mud. Given the recent vandalism to the spit hide this can only be seen as positive.

Patrolling the Harbour

Do this every day and he is going to have an impressive year list in his note book.

When the birding has been slow I have been adding to my collection of Butterfly and Dragonfly pictures although it is only in the last couple of weeks that the butterflies have started to appear in any numbers.

Another Four Spotted Chaser

Silver-studded Blue

Speckled Wood

Small Tortoiseshell

Adonis Blue

There have been some missed shots as well. An Emperor Dragonfly, a truly impressive species, that did not land in all the time I watched it. I took about fifty shots of it in flight but there is not a single decent shot amongst them. Also  a Green Hairstreak, searched for but not found. Next time perhaps.

A Few Quiet Days Birding

Its all been very quiet on the birding front lately. I have been out plenty of times but its just the usual suspects around, I have not managed to see anything new or unusual. I have had some target birds in mind, Turtle Dove, Flycatcher, Little Tern, Osprey and they are about, if only in small numbers, but so far not visible when I am there. Still it's great getting out into the countryside early in the morning, it really makes you feel alive. I know my luck will change soon, I just need to go birding even more often to make it happen!

The following pictures are the best from the past weeks birding and where better to start than the ubiquitous Whitethroat.

Whitethroat - Seaford Head

Linnet - Hope Gap

Another Whitethroat - Hope Gap

Rye Harbour looked like giving the best chance of seeing the Little Terns and at first I thought I was in luck, but you start to get suspicious when you realise they are not moving.

Perhaps if I added a bit of blur in Photoshop ......

Plenty of Common and Sandwich Terns there and a few Mediterranean Gulls on the edges of the Black-headed Gull colonies.

Sandwich Terns nesting amongst the Black-headed Gulls

Sandwich Tern

and in flight

Common Tern with half a fish

Mediterranean Gulls

I also called in on Arlington Reservoir. There are Turtle Doves around there somewhere and I often hear them calling but I have yet to see them. The Osprey did drop in whilst I was there but unfortunately I was off investigating the river just below the weir which is usually a good place for Damselflies and I missed it.

I did get to see a Great Crested Grebe trying to swallow a large fish. It took about a quarter of an hour to get it down as the bird was getting tired and the fish kept slipping out. It did succeed in the end but as it sailed off into the distance it still had the end of the fishes tail sticking out of its mouth.

Great Crested Grebe with its catch

Just a quick swallow

Proving a bit harder than expected - keeps slipping out

All gone - nearly!

 Do birds suffer from indigestion?

Nice to see so many so many fledglings about as well. This Pied Wagtail was busy trying to keep three hungry youngsters happy.

Already bigger than its mum.

And to finish off a nice sunset shot of a Sanderling in full summer Plumage.

Sanderling

On Seawatching

Interesting but I cannot see it catching on!


I tried a seawatch for the first time yesterday morning. Hardcore birding as I have seen it described. The sea was calm and there were plenty of birds about. We could identify Common Scoter, Red-breasted Merganser, Great Crested Grebe, and Gannet with probable sightings of Guillemot and various Grebes. However, I left feeling something was missing. This was not what I wanted from bird watching. Lots of black dots, mostly unrecognisable, no chance of getting pictures, and an element of doubt in anything you do identify.

For me birdwatching is about getting up close, making a positive identification, and getting a good quality record shot. Or, perhaps being a bit more realistic, having a good enough record shot to be able to go home and make the identification against the Collins Guide.

Arriving home with no pictures to look at also left something missing from the day. Fortunately I was home by 10.30 and after an early lunch I was soon starting to get edgy. I headed off into the snow flurries hoping the reflection from the snow would give the extra couple of stops needed for decent pictures. There were certainly a lot of birds about.

The cold weather has caused a lot of bird movement. Thousands of Fieldfares have been heading west in flocks of a few birds through to a few hundred. Great to look at but they are stripping all the berries from the trees and bushes. What will the the other birds live on and perhaps more interestingly where are the Redwings? We even had a dozen Fieldfares in the garden, a first that I can remember.

Fieldfare in the Garden

Looking for water to drink

On the local Gull roost at Goring Gap

 Other notable birds were Meadow Pipits and dozens of Skylarks down on the coastal fields looking for food. All of the birds seemed really focused on feeding and were not too bothered by people being close to them.

Skylark on the local Gull roost at Goring Gap

 

Skylark on the local Gull roost at Goring Gap

 A meadow Pipit running around in the failing light in search of that last mouthful of food.

Meadow Pipit in a hurry

Finally, on the way home I spotted Waxwings in Rustington. They have been returning to the roundabout on the A259 for a couple of weeks now but this was the first time I had spotted them. No light for a picture but this was a year tick for me and not too worried as I doubt that I would have been able to improve on the shots shown on my December blog.