Water Pipit

Having spent six hours on Tuesday, in the freezing cold, waiting for a Serin to appear and then having gone home without seeing it and without taking a single picture we decided to spend Wednesday  on some more reliable subjects.

First stop should have been Apuldram Church but I took the wrong turn so we made a revisit to the Cattle Egrets at Church Lane Warblington. There had been eight of them in the field with the cattle last week but this time there were no cattle and only the one Cattle Egret and that was too far away for a photograph.

Moving on we tried the Nore Stream. Plenty of dog walkers and the usual wildfowl but very little of interest. Which eventually led us back to our intended target, the Water Pipit at Apuldram. We had a quick look at the Yellowhammer flock in the horse paddock on the way but we were both keen to get to the river.

Dave spotted it as soon as we arrived. Fairly close and easy to see but very difficult to get a clear shot of it against a clean background.

Water Pipit

There were a couple of Rock Pipits in the area which was useful for comparison purposes. One of these seemed to want to occupy the same tuft of grass as the Water Pipit which resulted in frequent disputes and pursuits when the Water Pipit reappeared. This was some feisty bird and it was not sharing its territory with any rockies.

Rock Pipit

You occasionally get a heart stopping moment when something unusual pops up and you think you may have found a rarity. The bird below had me scrambling to get a record shot but my hopes were dashed when Dave pointed out that it was only a Wren. True but if it were a butterfly I would call it an aberration and would be searching the records to be able to put a name to it.

Wren with a crown stripe

Apuldram is the most reliable location in our patch for Yellowhammers. There are reports of the flock being thirty to forty strong although I usually only see around six. The manure heap seems to offer plenty of food for the foraging birds but photographing them against the yellow straw is always difficult. There are better opportunities when they perch up in the trees but to get close you often end up photographing into the sun.

Yellowhammer

We made a quick visit to the Bill but it all looked very quiet and with Church Norton and the North Wall failing to produce much recently we decided to head over too the wetland centre at Arundel. The Great White Egret if still present would be a patch first for me.

A good choice as it turned out. With most of the water frozen over there were some good picture opportunities. It was nice to get a couple of pictures of the GWE  where it did not look long necked and awkward.

Great White Egret

There were half a dozen snipe present but it was a choice between photographing them or following the GWE hoping that it would fall through the ice.


The Shelduck gave good picture opportunities from the hide and we saw our second Grey Wagtail of the day.

Shelduck

Grey Wagtail

Later we saw a couple of Water Rail. Icy conditions always seem to bring them out into the open.

Water Rail

A really enjoyable days birding spoilt only by a report that the Serin has been seen again at Tide Mills. It looks like another long day in the cold tomorrow.

Goldeneye

With another short break being predicted in our run of stormy weather,  I picked Dave up and we headed down to Pagham Harbour to see what was about. First stop was the North Wall. Unfortunately we had decided to give Climping Beach a miss on the way and so probably missed the Dusky Warbler that was found that morning.

The tide was in and there was a lot of water in the Breech Pool but it was good to see the numbers of ducks and geese had increased significantly since our last visit and in particular to have the background noise of the Brent Geese calling to one another. Waders were still in short supply with just a few of the usual Godwits, Snipe, and Curlew although Lapwing numbers had increased significantly.

The only unusual sight was a Yellowhammer searching for food along the path. It would have made a nice addition to the blog but it was flushed by a dog walker before I managed to get a decent shot.

We had a look around Pagham Lagoon for the possible American Herring Gull that had been reported but could not find anything that matched the description. A couple of pairs of Goldeneye were the only real picture opportunity.

Other birds on the lagoon were Tufted Duck, Little Grebes and the usual gulls.

Little Grebe

Ferry Pool had a good number of birds on it. It was interesting watching the flocks take to the air and swirl around but they were all settling at the back of the pool and there were no picture opportunities. A quick check at the bill showed that there was nothing much happening there either. With the weather starting to take a turn for the worse we headed for home stopping off at the Arundel Wetland Centre on the way.

Grey Heron

Grey Wagtail

We were hoping for Bullfinches but there were none showing whilst we were there. A Heron and a Grey Wagtail were the only pictures that I managed to get. There was a good sized Long-tailed Tit flock and a couple of Goldcrests moving through but with the sky darkening over it was time to head for home.

Not the greatest days birding but at least it was good to be out in the sun - if only for a short time.

Ring-necked Duck

Tuesday, and we finally had a day that promised a break in the storms. Where to go? The wind was still strong and the light poor so the smaller birds would be in short supply. Widewater for the Mergansers was one possibility but in the end we decided to take a trip down to Rooksbury Mill near Andover, to have a look for the two juvenile Ring-necked Ducks that had been reported there.

We took the back roads avoiding the rush hour traffic and enjoying the last of the autumn colours. We had expected to have some difficulty in separating the juvenile Ring-necks, from the juvenile Tufted Ducks and had anticipated having to spend the morning trying to identify our targets. As it happened we had no problem. When we got to Mill Lake there was nothing there. No Ring-necks, no Tufties, just a couple of Moorhens, some Little Grebes and a few Swans.

We couldn't believe our luck. A quick search of the river and adjoining Brooks Lake at least gave us a few Tufted Ducks and Gadwalls but there was no sign of the Ring-necks. A local birder told us that they had been there on the previous evening but that they now appeared to have moved on. What to do next? it looked like a long trip for nothing.

Fortunately we decided to have one last look at Mill Lake on the way back to the car. It still looked empty but then, out in the middle, there was a disturbance as a couple of small ducks broke to the surface of the lake. A quick check with the bins and it was clear that we had our Ring-necked Ducks.

We watched them for a couple of hours, hoping that they would come closer and give us the chance of better pictures. They did move a bit when dog walkers came past but seemed determined to stay out in the open water in the centre of the lake. It was a bit disappointing but I can't really complain. We both had good record shots and a life tick, so it had to be counted as a good birding day.

We stopped off at a couple of watercress beds in the Meon Valley on the way home. These were new birding sites for us. We were hoping to see a Water Pipit but the conditions were deteriorating. There were birds there, including Pipits, but with the wind picking up, the birds were hunkering down and identification was not easy.

We did see Green Sandpipers, Grey Wagtails, Pied Wagtails, and Little Egrets.There were a couple of large dark Pipits but we could not be sure. The only positive identification we made was on a Meadow Pipit.

This Grey Wagtail was interesting. It was happily feeding in the watercress beds until a Sparrowhawk flew through. It then froze and stayed that way until about five minutes after the Sparrowhawk had disappeared. It's the first time that I have ever seen one without its tail wagging.


I came away from Rooksbury Mill with lots of pictures but they all look very similar. With both of us only getting decent shots of two birds I have a feeling that Dave's blog will look very similar to mine.

Ravens

A recent holiday with the family in North Devon proved to be very enjoyable, if just a bit frustrating as far as bird watching went.

I had great plans - a detour on the way down to see the Purple Heron and Red-footed Falcon, a trip to Lundy Island giving me a four hour sea watch and a chance to see the Puffins, and a couple of walks planned for locations with Wood Warblers. If I was really lucky and got a few hot days I might also get an early High Brown Fritillary.

Needless to say, it did not quite happen as planned. We were late leaving due to a hairdressers appointment that I had not factored in (not mine) and I had to abandon the detour. The trip to Lundy was great but I only saw a couple of Gannets and a few Guillemots on the boat trips and the Puffins were too far away for a photograph. I did one of the Wood Warbler walks without seeing any Wood Warblers and then when I went to my banker site at Watersmeet it was so crowded that I couldn't even get into the car park.

Still, there's always something to look at and in flight shots of the Ravens and Fulmars from the local cliffs proved to be one of the best attractions.

Raven

and with a tasty morsel of food!

Raven

Fulmar

Fulmar

Plenty of Grey Wagtails about

Grey Wagtail

and juvenile Grey Wagtails

and even younger Grey Wagtails

Linnet

Rock Pipits in the coastal steams

A Whitethroat

A juvenile Warbler - probably a Chiffchaff

and just for the record a very distant  and heavily cropped shot of a Puffin

It's not the raft of excellent photographs that I had hoped to come home with but it is the record of the birds seen on my holiday.

Bullfinches

As far as waders and wildfowl are concerned I am not a great fan of Pulborough Brooks. There are great expanses of water, but the birds are usually too distant even for record shots. The place is actually better for the smaller birds with Bullfinches, Goldcrests, and later in the year Nightingales being relatively easy to capture.

Today, however, with the brooks and scrapes likely to be frozen over and with the possibility of finding birds out on the ice looking for open water, it seemed worth another visit. It was worth the try but it was nearly a wasted trip. There were birds on the ice, as we had expected, but they were all the common ducks. We managed to find a group of ten Snipe foraging near West Mead Hide but other than those and a few Lapwing I did not see a single wader all day.

Snipe

Fortunately the visit was rescued by the Bullfinches and a few good looking Fieldfares we spotted as we walked around.

Fieldfare

We found a small flock of six Bullfinches close by West Mead hide, a couple at Fattengates and another three or four at the top of the zigzags. They were all very mobile and it was difficult to get shots of them but it did occupy us for an interesting hour or so.

Bullfinch

Keen to improve on our Bullfinch shots we then headed off to the Arundel Wetland Centre where Dave had photographed a couple of females the previous week.  They were still where he had left them, feeding on the buddleia bushes just outside the Sand Martin hide. These were a little tamer than the Pulborough birds and had no intention of leaving their food source even when people passed within a few feet of them. Unfortunately though, there was no male to photograph.

Female Bullfinch

A quick look from the Sand Martin hide gave us the unexpected bonus of a Grey Wagtail actively feeding on the waters edge and the interesting challenge of could you get a shot that was not a complete blur as it raced up and down

Grey Wagtail

I had one final opportunity for a photograph as we headed back for the car. One of my favourite birds the Dunnock, almost too close to get him in the frame.

Dunnock

Overall, not a bad day. A few decent pictures of the Bullfinches, sightings of Water Rail, Treecreeper and Goldcrest and a few year ticks and I went home happy.