Eastern Olivaceous Warbler

I don't do twitches - but when I do, I particularly dislike twitching "little brown jobs". Birding for me is about spending time with the birds, observing and connecting with them and hopefully leaving with a good record shot or on very rare occasions a quality picture of the bird. A warbler twitch is definitely not the place to be.

Then why did I go to Farlington to see the Eastern Olivaceous Warbler? It is a rare bird, it would be a life tick and it was on what I consider to be my larger birding patch but equally I knew that I wouldn't like it. I called Dave up to see if he wanted to go but he refused to have anything to do with it. A man of principles!

What's worse is that it was a Sunday and parking at Farlington Marsh would be a nightmare. I got out of that one by parking just along the coast at Broadmarsh and walking the mile and a half to the twitch. The walk in was great with Spotted Flycatchers, Whinchats, and various other birds on show but I didn't stop to photograph them for fear of missing the target bird.

I did get to see it, two or three times, probably for a total of thirty seconds in a two hour and a half hour watch, but did I really see it? I was actually too busy getting the camera onto the bird and in focus to really spend time looking at it.

The twitch was exactly what I expected and I didn't enjoy it. I don't blame anyone. It's a free country and the bird does not belong to anyone other than perhaps the finder. I am fortunate in being able to stand off with a large lens and still get my picture, as are the expensive scope brigade but other less fortunate people still want to see the bird. Some people do get too close but then who am I to set the rules.

What else was around? Well, I didn't get to see any Bearded Tits and on the walk out, the Spotted Flycatchers and Whinchats had all disappeared. Disappointing day? Not really, that evening I did enjoy adding a tick to the life list that I don't like to admit to keeping!

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And that should have been an end to the blog.........

.....except three days later and the bird is still there. My record shot above is poor, numbers at the twitch will have dropped, the weather is nice, and even Dave is now interested. So back we go and I am really glad we did. On Sunday, with all the crowds around, the bird was playing hard to get and I ended up with three record shots from about two and a half hours watching. Today it was showing a little better and I had five hundred plus shots from about an hours watching. 

Admittedly most of the shots are poor, being out of focus or with the bird partialy in cover, but there are a couple of decent ones in amongst them. More importantly I had time to study the bird today. The tail pumping is very distinct and it seems to have a different hunting style to other warblers. If I ever come across another one I think I would now have a good chance of recognising it.

Below are some of today's shots. A slightly better result than the picture above!

If only all little brown jobs showed as well as this.

Red-necked Phalarope

I wasn't going to bother going to see the Phalarope at Pulburough Brooks. It's a great place for birds but not so good for bird photographers, especially in the summer when the water in the brooks seems to retreat back over the horizon. Then sitting at home you start to think - I haven't seen a Phalarope for a couple of years; I haven't been out all day; I do need to top up on the bird feed supplies. In the end I was convinced. I did get to see it and I did get my shot although it was a little distant!

Red-necked Phalarope on a 600mm lens combination

With a big crop you can at least see what it is. It was nice to catch up with it although I don't think that it will be taking pride of place amongst my Phalarope pictures.

Better news though, in a Spotted Flycatcher, that at first landed too close for me to focus on. Fortunately, after staring me out for about fifteen seconds, it did give me a second chance, moving a little further away before quickly disappearing into the distance. One of those all too fleeting magic moments.

Spotted Flycatcher

This was my first Spotted Flycatcher of the autumn although I have seen a number of Pied Flycatchers. A reversal of the usual autumn norm.

Walking back up the zig-zags to the visitors centre its always worth inspecting the Stinking Willies (Ragwort) for insects. This time finding an obliging Clouded Yellow.

Clouded Yellow

and a Painted Lady in reasonable condition

Painted Lady

A couple of shots from the past week. A Whinchat, all I had to show from a morning searching for the Beachy Head Montagu's Harrier.

Whinchat

and an ugly duckling but it won't be long before he turns into a beautiful Reed Bunting.

Reed Bunting

Nice to get some pictures but we could do with a rarity on the patch.

Wryneck

It's Wryneck time again, one of the highlights of the birding year. They are always such a fantastic bird to see and to photograph. There may not be many of them but when they are feeding up, before crossing the channel, they do tend be loyal to a patch and so can be relatively easy to find.

This year there looked to be a good candidate at Farlington Marsh. We gave the Bank Holiday weekend a miss but were along there early on Tuesday morning. Unfortunately so where a lot of other people. 

My best pictures have always come from watching the birds feeding pattern and sitting down in the open where you expect it to get to in about ten minutes time. My experience is that if you stay seated and move slowly the bird will ignore you and come close. See here for some examples.

Today was a bit different. As soon as the bird was sighted there was a bit of a scrum. It's understandable, everyone wants  to see the bird and that includes me but all I got were a couple of rather distant shots before the bird took fright and disappeared.

Wryneck

Wryneck

If it's still there in a weeks time I might have another go.


There have been a lot of other migrants through over the past few days. They mostly seem to be juveniles but I am still hoping for a some better pictures and I still haven't seen a Spotted Flycatcher.

Whinchat

Pied Flycatcher

Pied Flycatcher

Yellow Wagtail

Wheatear

And from a trip over to Anchor Bottom to look for Clouded Yellows, no pictures of said butterfly, although we did see two brightly coloured males and one female. It was just too hot to chase after them up and down the slopes.


Worth going though, as there were still Adonis Blue on the wing and I needed Autumn Lady's Tresses to complete my Orchid year.

Adonis Blue

Autumn Lady's Tresses

Autumn Lady's Tresses

Thirty six species of orchid seen this year plus a number of variants and hybrids. It could have been more but it would have needed a few trips to Scotland and the north of England to find them. I am not going to do long distance twitching for single targets but combine birds, orchids, dragonflies and butterflies and the trips look more acceptable.

Long-tailed Blue

With an influx of Long-tailed Blue butterflies being reported along the south coast we headed over to Whitehawk Hill to search for them. The best information we had was somewhere around the transmitter tower, so the plan was for a search for the food plant, everlasting pea Lathyrus latifolius, and then to stake it out and wait to see what turned up.

In practice it turned out to be a lot easier than that, as there were already two people searching the target area when we arrived.

We had a number of sightings with a maximum of two in the air at any one time so probably somewhere around four to six being present. They seemed to be based over the fence in the allotments and where making occasional forays out into the scrub area looking for Everlasting Pea. Their presence in the allotments could well herald a problem for the gardeners pea crops in a few weeks time.

My photographs are both of the same specimen and show a hole in the  under wing where the eye spot should be. It looks as though the combination of eye spots and short wispy tails has served its purpose and fooled a bird into attacking the wrong end of the butterfly.

The last influx of the Long-tailed Blue was in 2015 and that year the eggs laid by the migrants resulted in fresh UK born butterflies on the wing at the end of October. My blog of the 25th October of that year shows a freshly emerged individual. These are the pictures you really want rather than the slightly worn individual above.

They are said to not be able to survive the winters in this country in any stage of their life cycle but who knows, with global warming that may change. Great for butterfly fans but not so good for gardeners or farmers as they are considered a pest on the continent.



Having found our target species early on we then headed over to Steyning to have another look for the Brown Hairstreaks. This must be the most frustrating of all the Hairstreak family but at least this time we managed to see a few and get a couple of record shots.

Still not the pictures I really want but I will get them eventually. It's good to have a challenge in life, it's just a pity that you have to take it on when it is over 30 degrees out in the sun.

Grayling and others

Just catching up on a few of the butterfly photographs I have taken over the past few weeks. Best find was probably this Grayling, a butterfly that gets harder to see in Sussex as each year goes by. This one was on Windover Hill and despite an hours searching it was the only one I could find.

Grayling

They are always a bit difficult to spot against the Chalk flints but this one did at least put down amongst some greenery making it a little more visible. Although they always settle with wings closed they will, if threatened, "pop up" the forewing flashing a patch of orange and an eye. I managed to get a half hearted response on my initial approach but it then seemed to tire of that game and just fell asleep and ignored my presence.

Grayling

Lots of lovely Brimstones along with other butterflies at Houghton Forest but perhaps not in the numbers we have seen in previous years. The high winds and stormy weather at the begining of the month may have had an impact.

Brimstone

Brown Argus

Brown Argus

Small Heath

Chalkhill Blue

Red Admiral

Lots of Silver-washed Fritillaries at Houghton as well but when you did manage to catch up with them they were in a really tatty state.



Newtimber Hill is one of the most reliable sites for Silver-spotted Skippers. They were there but again not in big numbers but then we were probably four weeks later than usual in looking for them.

Silver-spotted Skipper

Wall Brown

Chalkhill Blues still looking good though.

Chalkhill Blue

Chalkhill Blue

Dark Green Fritillary

Last but not least a Large White, we tend to ignore them but they really are quite a beautiful butterfly.

Large White

No sign of a Clouded Yellow yet or perhaps even one of the rarer migrants from the continent but there is still time.