Penduline Tit in Bedfordshire

On the 29th of December I was down in Bedfordshire at around 08:20 in the morning in the hope of seeing the Penduline Tit that appeared to have roosted on a small reedy pool on Prior CP. On arrival there was very little of note and no sign of the bird, a short while later it burst out from the reeds giving its distinctive somewhat high pitched calls, it flew a short way and landed in the bottom of some reeds where it showed briefly. A short while later it flew towards myself and others and landed on some nearby reeds where it showed really well!

Ripping apart some bulrushes... 

Some more of my shaky-shaky video footage: 

Cracking little bird, and a British tick. Had seen the species in Bulgaria in a small flock and previously had dipped a bird in South Yorkshire.

Happy New Year!

Decided I probably better start using my blog again, its been a bit neglected the past 12 months or so, so I thought I would resurrect it, somewhat, I hope!

I finished off a truly fantastic and exciting year with the Ivory Gull in Uig harbour on the Isle of Skye on the 31st of December. I also managed to see an immature White-tailed Eagle, always superb to see. However the fairly grim weather did not allow for any additional birds to be seen, no Golden Eagles were going to be flying in the weather on the day. So say it was 'quite bad rain' does not quite cut it!

Ivory Gull.....

What I call a 'proper bird', phwoar!

2015

Dawn today saw me heading down to East Yorkshire with Beadnell Birder and Michael Murphy to hopefully clap eyes on the Little Bustard that had turned up, the first properly twitchable bird since the mid 90's apparently! 

Little Bustard keeping down...

Breakfast and then we took in the local Med Gulls in Scarborough, which, of course, but on a nice show! A total of 9 birds noted, with one 1st winter and the rest adults. 

Meds....

An awesome 1st of January, but nothing at Lambton Pond on my visit, turns out though that the Tundra Bean Goose turned up after we had been. 

Update: April, May, and a tiny bit of June.

It has, yet again, been a long time since my last blog post update! May was manic and I simply did not get around to posting in April. My last update was the Great Spotted Cuckoo, which now seems almost an age away! Plenty of time for birding with work and personal time, but here are some of the personal highlights for me in the past few months.

The end of March allowed me to finally catch up with the female King Eider in Lothian; I’d never had a chance to see a female King Eider before so this was a bit of an education for me. The end of March saw a Baikal Teal in Cambridgeshire, I think these are absolutely stunning birds and so I went with my friend from Warwickshire to have a peek, we then went onto Norfolk where we had superb views of Stone-Curlew, by far my best in the UK. In April I jetted off to Bulgaria where I had an amazing time birding, loads of new birds for me and upon return I headed straight for Flamborough Head where at dawn I managed to catch up with the Crag Martin before its departure (and never to be seen again), later in the same day I also saw my first Tawny Pipit which was more than a nice bonus. Day’s later I was attempting to twitch the welsh Franklin’s Gull on further news, no news meant a day at Ham Wall RSPB where I had super views of at least 2 Great White Egrets. A few days later I had my first ever Hoopoe in Norfolk at Thornham, a long awaited bird that I had previously dipped no less than 7 times. A week or so later and another failed attempt for the Franklin’s Gull, however at least 7 Dotterel eased the pain, however the Collared Pratincole in Devon totally wiped away the pain. After work the following day I managed to catch up with 2 Dotterel at North Gare, and the very next day I managed to see the cracking male Collared Flycatcher after work, with a supporting cast of Western Subalpine Warbler a few bushes along. April ended with a quick dodge in to see a Wryneck on Holy Island on the 30^th.

(Collared Pratincole - Devon - Andrew Kinghorn)

May was certainly far from quiet, a really busy time at work but I still managed to fit in some quality birds. A Woodchat Shrike just up the road from Cresswell Pond NWT on the 6^th May was a superb surprise after just returning from a few days birding in Morocco. However a much more appealing bird for me was the cracking adult Lesser Yellowlegs a few days later at Beadnell, the wader theme continued after this when I managed to see the Pectoral Sandpiper nearby at Hoppen Kiln Flash. The weekend saw me seeing a Shorelark on South Gare, then I took my friend to see the Hoopoe in Beverly and that showed superbly well, I just wished I had brought my camera! A mere 8 days later and I had stunning views of a Spotted Sandpiper at Potteric Carr YWT in South Yorkshire, it showed superbly well and allowed me to finally have quality close quarter views of this smart American shorebird. Two Red-backed Shrikes in East Yorkshire was the beginning of what was a seemingly endless steam of quality birds, with Icterine Warbler at Hummersea the following day and superb views of a Great White Egret on Cowpen Marsh. The next day I had superb views of a male Little Bittern at Elton Reservoir in Manchester and later on in the day a Broad-billed Sandpiper at Nosterfield NR in North Yorkshire. Days later I had cracking views of the female Black-headed Bunting in West Runton in Norfolk which took my life list to 399. On the Friday after work I jammed in on 2 European Bee-Eaters at South Gare and then an Icterine Warbler on Hartlepool Headland on the evening. The month was drawn to a close with Ross’s Gull at Bowling Green Marsh in Devon, this cracking little 1^st summer bird marked my 400^th in the UK! What a pleasure to see. A short drive to SE Wales (Gwent) and I was at Newport Wetlands where I enjoyed listening to and watching the singing Savi’s Warbler, a subtle but handsome bird.

(Spotted Sandpiper - Potteric Carr - Andrew Kinghorn)

June went off with a bang; Short-toed Eagle at dawn on the 1^st is the undoubted highlight of my year so far. Then Buff-breasted Sandpiper and Spectacled Warbler the next day made the day almost surreal. Work was rained off on the 4^th and on the way home a handy Great Reed Warbler turned up 10 mins away from my location, a look at this beauty before heading back to the office was a must. The latter species was a one I had missed several opportunities with this year and thought my hopes for another year were up, I guess this just goes to show that you never can really know in this hobby.

 (Short-toed Eagle crowd at dawn)

(Short-toed Eagle as the light imporved)

A simply superb couple of months! 

Long time, no post!

Hi everyone,

It has been ages since I last blogged, this is just a quick blog post of what I hope to be many to get back into a habit of blogging more regularly. So much has happened in birding since the last time I have blogged, 2014 has already been absolutely fantastic with Yellow-rumped Warbler, American Herring Gull, and Great Spotted Cuckoo being the clear highlights so far. Here are my attempts to do the Great Spotted Cuckoo justice.

(Great Spotted Cuckoo - copyright Andrew Kinghorn)

(Great Spotted Cuckoo - copyright Andrew Kinghorn)

On Saturday I was invited our by Jack Bucknall to Dumfries and Galloway, unsurprisingly we dipped the Hoopoe but we were successful in connecting with the presumed returning Red-breasted Goose there. There are two birds currently about in the area, a yellow ringed bird and an unringed bird. We were tipped of by Mike Youdale that the Barnacle Geese often move to Loanningfoot, sure enough the birds were present here and we drove down the famers track at West Preston Farm, after about 40 minutes the bird was finally picked up and after a short time we were able to confirm it was also the unringed bird. Superb! I absolutely love Red-breasted Geese.

 (Red-breasted Goose - copyright Andrew Kinghorn)

 (Red-breasted Goose - copyright Andrew Kinghorn)

(Red-breasted Goose - copyright Andrew Kinghorn)

I will be back blogging again very soon, I hope!