June 2015

Once again it has been an age since I have updated my blog! Managed to see a fair few good birds since the last update and only really missed out on Paddyfield Warbler and Eastern Black Eared Wheatear, the latter one a bit more concerning than the former.

Anyhow, here are some of my highlights from the past 5 days...

Cretz....

At long last!!...

 Gull-billed Tern at Old Moor RSPB, thanks to staff for staying open late!

Wacko-Squacco at Saltholme RSPB yesterday afternooon..

Cheers

Laughing Gull

A rather worrying morning when on arrival at New Brighton just after 8AM on Wednesday, when the birders announced that there had been no sign at all of the Laughing Gull, some two and a half hours passed when I picked it up gliding just above my head and eastwards towards the beach, it landed on the tide line, had a little feed, flew around the fort and then went and landed on the pontoon where it has been found the previous day. Interestingly, when it appeared it was the only gull on the coast flying around, preferring to avoid even the Black-headed Gulls. Apparently they do much the same in the states, preferring their own species company or a solitary lifestyle, presumable this is down to a very different feeding habit and behavior preference to American Herring Gull? Anyone know any more on this? Even on the pontoon it preferred the Redshanks, totally avoiding the Herring Gulls.

Laugher...

Had a dodge to Nosterfield NR on the way home, highlight being the distant drake American Wigeon and a Brent Goose. Last time I visited I was gulling, saw this beauty...

Gotta love a juv Casp!

Ridgway's Canada Goose

On Saturday I headed out north west in order to see the Ridgway's Canada Goose, thanks to Brian Hendersons superb directions we were swiftly on site and located the Ridgway's Canada. As per, there has been the usual BirdForum and car journey discussions on whether or not it has a potential to reach the UK. The birds only has to get to Greenland and then latch onto a carrier....bit of an ask though!

Mainly spending a lot of its time with the local Canadas, however mixed in with Pinks and Greylags.

Ridg....

At least its not on some lake in the Midlands, would slightly dampen its credentials somewhat!

After the Ridgway's we headed off to another site and managed some more than 'standard' views of a pair of Golden Eagles hunting together some 25m in the air, and at one point were about 40m away, as well as Goshawk. Then a look at the two female Ring-necked Ducks, followed by a cracking 120 or so Red Kites at the feeding station.

All pics of Golden Eagle by Harry Murphy, please don't  email to ask me where I saw these birds ...

I'd never had views like it, and doubt I ever will do again. Crystal clear skies, snowy landscape, and two Golden Eagle hunting together some 40m away. Amazing.

Amble Caspian Gull Revisited

With all the recent talk of 'mantle shade' variability in Slaty-backed Gulls lately (due to the recent Irish bird) I got thinking again about the Amble Caspian Gull, the bird would represent a 2nd for Northumberland, following the 1st accepted record being a bird in the summer months at Grindon Lough one evening.

During September I tweeted out that I had 'scored' the Amble Caspian Gull against a paper in British Birds. As with most thing to do with Caspian Gull I got interested fairly swiftly, the paper is written by Chris Gibbins, Grzegorz Neubauer and Brian J. Small. It's a very impressively written and thorough paper in the December 2011 issue of British Birds. It was handily written only recently, as our knowledge of the acceptable variability in Caspian Gulls has grown, it was written to deal with the pitfalls of possible hybrids.

If you have time to sit with a highlighter and read the article I can highly recommend it. Some particularly interesting features were listed in the article and the article has a positive conclusion. So if you are interested in gulls make sure you read it!

'Table 1' in the article is what this entire brief blog post is about, it lays out a scoring system for adult Caspian Gulls. I thought I would run the Amble Caspian Gull through the test, trying to be as objective as possible. The reason for this is that although it was from a 'Caspian Gull colony', it was a bit naughty to fail to point out that the colonies in that area are known for having mixed pair.

Lets be clear, this bird was a '4th winter', if you like, so NOT an adult. However it would appear that all the features listed in the table remain unchanged between this age and adult as they are so similar. Seems as though the species is seemingly so rare north of the Tyne I thought it best to be 'cruel' rather than 'kind', to 'edge on the side of caution'. So when scoring the bird I gave a realistic, if not somewhat mean score in order to be 'sure' on the outcome.

When I scored it in September it came out with a score of 7, but I scored it again this month and came out with 8. Even though I was very cruel with the final score of 8, the article comments; "For adult birds, it is clear (fig. 6) that a bird with a score of less than 9 should be pure Caspian, while one with a score of 9 or more is not safely identifiable as a Caspian." Later the same article goes on to say "Frequency statistics indicate that these scores can be used to separate even the most extreme (atypical) first-winter birds and the vast majority (c. 99%) of adults with confidence."

If you have got the article then you can go away and have a look for yourself, but basically the score I allocated for the black band on P10, overall P5, overall P4, the iris peppering, the eye-ring colour, the bill, and the leg length would likely go uncontested! The only feature that I think could be contested was what I scored the overall black to white ratio on P10, I scored this a 2. As 'having more black than white', however I think this may have been quite unfair! Even so, it still passed the test.

However, this was based on me giving the bill a score of 1, which is "slim, slight gonydeal angle (ratio 2.4–2.79)", whereas 2, "intermediate (ratio 2.0–2.39)", may have been a fairer assessment. If we said the bill was 2, and dropped the black to ratio down to 1 ("approximately equal black and white"), the bird would still come out with a score of 8. Which is still pure Caspian Gull, I think that my original score of 7 was being a bit too kind. I do wonder how the Cromer (Norfolk) bird would score.....

I personally fail to see how the Able bird could be a hybrid, it even sounded well and truly the part in the field. Time and research may eradicate all of this data, but at the moment I think it's safe to shimmy the 'Amble Casp' into the 'Casp column'.  Most people who have commented (minus LGRE) have not expressed concern, the bill may appear a little chunky and deep at the base, but a quick Google search can show that this isn't too abnormal for Caspian Gull. I think for now, I'll trust the 99% percentage. So I will say...

Casp....

Whoooarrr.

That's why birders go to Iceland...

Couldn't resist going to see the Harlequin Duck in Aberdeen on Saturday, I heard it had been showing well, but I had not quite expected it to be showing quite as well as it actually did. It looks rather settled as well, may stay to become even more stunning yet?

Harl...

On the way back the female King Eider quite conveniently (for my mates in the car, who had never seen one) was seen off Kincraig Point, so we went to see that. Difficult viewing and it took about 20 minutes or so to pick up in difficult viewing conditions. I quite like female King Eider, and the accompanying rafts of Velvet Scoter offshore were a bit of a treat.

Spent Sunday checking the local areas in the AM, very little about and no sign of the Tundra Bean Goose with the Greylag flock, but looks like flock has broken off into two, so presumably its around somewhere with a handful of Greylags. I spent the afternoon at North Shields Fish Quay which was really good, the 2nd winter Iceland Gull was showing fantastically and remaining faithful to one particular spot underneath a ship. Later in the day towards 15:30 I picked up a juvenile Iceland Gull drifting into view from behind part of the Fish Quay, it eventually came out to play and had pretty good views. No sign of any Glaucs though. 

2nd win Ice...

Not even Photoshop could save my horrendous camera work at 15:30. Juv Ice...

North Shields Fish Quay 2014

A brief afternoon visit to the Fish Quay on the afternoon of the 28th resulted in some pretty decent views of the 2nd winter Iceland Gull, which may well have even been a plumage tick for me, I can't recall having seen a 2nd winter before.

Ice....

Nice, but would have preferred a good old 1st winter Casp, cracking birds. 

Ebony....

and....

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!

Sylvia curruca blythi?

Just some pics of the bird that may by sylvia curruca blythi? Some discussion currently on going on Twitter...

Past weeks birding...

The past weeks birding has predominantly been full of only twitching highlights, Teesside is currently dreadful, Lambton Pond is dreadful, the coast is dreadful, seawatching is dreadful, this just sin't the September I envisioned really!

Monday was an excellent day, I headed on down to Cheshire to catch up with the Leach's Petrels off Leasowe in Cheshire. This is a species that really had avoided my eyes up until Monday, I was fortunate enough to see around 8, of which myself and Zac Hinchcliffe jammed in on all. An excellent morning and was great to share the experience with Zac, a similarly aged birder I have known for around 5 years now. On the way back I called into Bishop Middleham and jammed in on the Pectoral Sandpiper someone had found, of course it wasn't there during the many hours or searching I put in over the past year. But that's birding!

 A Cheshire Lesser...

A Leach's I was actually able to photograph!

Nothing much happened until Friday when I finally had a good bird at Lambton Pond and also managed to see the American Golden Plover at St Mary's Island in Northumberland. The AGP showed well, the banter was excellent (as is always the case in Northumbs) and I rounded the day of nicely with a Pink-foot at Lambton Pond! In between this I ventured down to Teesside in what may have been the most quiet few hours on the Marshes I have ever experienced, exceedingly poor for the time of year. What is going on?!?!

Lambton Pond Pink.. 

 St Mary's Island American Golden Plover showed well..

Yesterday was spent dipping the Brown Shrike in Hampshire, but lets not dwell on that! A rather long trek later saw myself and team looking at 3 juvenile Blue-winged Teals. Which were "kind of" nice, certainly better than the worst bird I have ever seen to date, that being the eclipse drake of Saltholme RSPB back in 2011. As always a whole load of nonsense on BirdForum on various threads in regards to the origin of the Teals. Why is it so unusual for a presumed family part of Blue-winged Teals to reach Britain then end up on the east coast? I don't get the difficulty, its hardly as though they are the rarest set of wildfowl to reach our shores.

What Blue-winged Teals looks like..

2 of the 3 Blue-winged Teals, my camera could not fake taking a pic of the 3rd bird. 

Speaking of wildfowl...isn't it about time that they accepted that Baikal Teal from Flam? Not that I want to start a debate of course, not in my nature at all. Also some easterly winds are on the way, good news!

The Snook & The Rather Great Snipe

The weekend begun with the checking of the waders at Seaton Snook, the tide wasn't really favourable and so not many wader at all. But I had some absolutely superb views of Dunlin and Ringed Plover, gave me a chance to try out my latest purchase; a Canon SX50 bridge camera, absolutely superb results for only £300.

First of all a slow approach...

Then some mega views and photo opportunities...

Only a single and rather solitary Ringed Plover, but sadly not a Semipalmated Plover!

Sunday saw a near enough to first light trip down to Spurn to see the Great Snipe. On arrival I was shocked to be told it was still present, a check of my phone also revealed that Oli Metcalf had already kindly alerted me to its remained presence 30 mins previously. The bird showed rather well, allowing for pics and video to be taken, I haven't had a chance to upload the video yet but that is something I'll get around to later on and will post it here on the blog.

Yes...it was rather showy. This photo wasn't that sharp which was frustrating, but I was more interested in watching and enjoying the bird. The next day I went to go look for Leach's Petrel on the Cheshire coast, more on that to follow.

Weeks Activities...

From now on please could all regular readers bear in mind that all the pics that appear on this blog are mine unless otherwise specified, just saves me having to add text all the time under each picture. Call me lazy if you want!

A busy weeks birding, Friday and Saturday were spent mainly in the Obs watching the passage. Personal highlights included Black Tern, Pomarine Skua, Velvet Scoter, Balearic Shearwaters, Sooty Shearwaters, and a juv Long-tailed Skua. It was also brilliant to watch the first Brents of the year passing the Obs.

Sauturday was superb, I managed to catch up with the trapped and ringed Common Rosefinch, I then headed on down to Teesside for the wader spectacle at Seaton Snook. I also called into see the Wryneck at at Headland, and also managed to connect with 3 Little Stints and several Curlew Sandpipers over both Saturday and Sunday.

Sunday saw me up in Northumberland mid afternoon to see the White-rumped Sandpiper again, it was pretty close this time and I had absolutely fantastic views of these stunning birds. I even managed some half decent pics, which can be seen below. A call into the Snook on the evening produced nothing but a single Curlew Sandpiper.

Lambton Pond remains generally quiet, I am also beginning to doubt I am going to get the hoped for Pectoral Sandpiper this year. But you really don't know, it may happen just yet.