Lark of the Shore

As usual South Tyneside has turned up some pretty bad birds with Shorelark being the highlight of today. Don’t you just hate that place, what with Greenish Warbler, Firecrest, Yellow-browed Warbler, famous Eastern Crowned Warbler, and now Shorelark!

A few texts from some mates alerted me to the birds presence in Mango’s Car Park. So with my University tutorial (yeah, that’s what they call a lesson) over I headed down and picked up on the bird nearly straight away. I had some good views of the bird an decided to leave it in peace so it could feed around the cars in the car park.

I had a quick look in Trow Quarry itself and was rewarded with Lesser Whitethroat and 2 Goldcrest. A Willow Warbler was present but it’s hardly an Eastern Crowned is it?

Special thanks to Stephen Egglestone for letting me use his photos for my blog. Greatly appreciated as it is to everyone who lets me use their images: Derek, Dougie, Mark, James, and others. Thanks again.

(Shore Lark -  © Stephen Egglestone)

(Shore Lark - © Stephen Egglestone)

Click on the images to enlarge them

Until next time, Foghorn out! NO, I won’t stop doing on about the Eastern Crowned Warbler! lol

I don’t really care about that Flycatcher

I mean who would travel all that way and take a knackering 3 mile walk to go and look for a bird like that! Well I was going to but sadly the plans didn’t go ahead, not to worry can’t win them all!

However every dark cloud has a sliver lining. This morning was a good seawatch but frustrating when a Pom flew past and a few of us couldn’t get on it. There’ll be others; I wish I could say that about the Alder/Willow flycatcher! This afternoon things looked up when I couldn’t resist a Woodchat Shrike at Hartlepool Headland, cracking views and a lifer! A Snow Bunting around the corner was very interesting especially considering how I found it. mILLYg had turned up and we were walking down this alley by a Childs play park (don’t get any ideas!)

So here we were walking along and the conversation when something like this.
mILLYg: “So where’s this Snow Bunting then?”
(Whilst mILLYg was talking I was thinking: I don’t actually know but think its on the headland – or along those lines)
Foghorn: (not even a second after mILLYg got his question out). “There.” (I point at the bird 7ft in front of us as we flushed a little way)

No kidding! Was really funny so we both burst out laughing. We had cracking views of the Snow Bunting and then I had one last quick look at the Woodhcat Shrike and then off home. Here are my best efforts at photographing the birds:

(Snow Bunting - Hartlepool Headland)

(Woodchat Shrike - cick photo to enlarge)

Until next time, Foghorn out! OH! I didn't want to see that Flycatcher, I will convince myself!

(Woodchat Shrike - Derek Charlton)

(Woodchat Shrike - Derek Charlton)

Birding at technology in the 21st century

 (If some of the text in this post is a different colour then you can click on it as it is a link to another page online.)

There can be no doubt about it; technology has assisted birding hugely over the years. With the invention of the pager allowing the ‘early’ twitchers to get to see birds that often they would only hear about a couple of weeks later! Now of course the pager is somewhat becoming ‘old news’ with bird information now being able to be sent to peoples mobiles, or of course people can check the internet with their mobile phones to see what has been seen. Speaking of the internet where would we birders and twitchers be without it? For one thing we wouldn’t have Eastern Crowned Warbler on our British list see HERE and HERE, read first one then second. Then there is a the many bird news services broadcasting news day and sometimes night so that birders around the country can see what birds they desire. Let’s not forget the countless forums, blogs, and other bird related websites that we use or can use if we need them. Additionally how do you know what many birds you have never seen before sound like? The answer is thanks to technology bird calls and sounds can be recorded and uploaded for everyone on the planet who can access it to enjoy. We are also fortunate enough to view images of birds taken on our doorsteps, counties, and the other parts of the world, on occasions you can view images taken on the other side of the world on the same day they were taken! Technology is great for birding and I am sure many wouldn’t disagree, in fact if you are enjoying this post so far you can’t disagree. ;)

However (you might have know this was coming) technology also has its draw backs when it comes to birding in this day and age, or so I think anyway. You can of course make your own mind up and please do leave your comments in the comment section as I would like to hear them. This post is fuelled by the recent Brown Flycatcher on Shetland thread, until late on this afternoon there was a big debate going on about a photo and how much it looked like a Spotted Flycatcher. It turned out in the end that it was actually a Spotted Flycatcher and the finder said that he couldn’t be 100% sure, good and honest of the observer to actually admit he rushed into the ID a bit. However it got me thinking, we are now always wanting to see photos instead of just taking peoples word for it when they claim rare birds. I personally think that notes and descriptions are sufficient enough to get a bird accepted, even if it is exceptionally rare. Are we not just relying too much on images to confirm if a bird is what the observer(s) say it is!

Don’t get me wrong I like to see pictures but if a picture was of bad quality and features were hard to make out and decipher between species I would take the observers word for it. Am I naive, perhaps? I just think that sometimes birders (myself included) just don’t look at the bigger picture and need to see a photo of a rarity to believe it and if it doesn’t quite look right we question the validity of the record.

Don’t hate me by the way! Until next time, Foghorn out!

ps. Go back to the post with the photo of the Eastern Crowned Warbler on it. Hover over it and see how many views it had. Compare that to the picture next to it. LOL

Sharp-tailed Sandpiper - Greatham Creek, Teesside - 20/09/2010

The first day of Uni went ok but I was tired when I got home as was looking forward to a nice restful evening. I was watching The Simpsons on Channel 4 when news came through that a Sharp-tailed Sandpiper has been seen at Greatham Creek. I rushed my tea down, topped up my engine oil, and was on my way. I arrived at about 7:30ish and got good views in fairly poor light, however 5 minutes after I had been there the light deteriorated further making viewing even more difficult. I had cracking views if I am honest and at fairly close range. A fantastic bird and a one I will no doubt be forgetting for a while, its one of those birds I didn’t think I was going to see ever in the UK never mind locally.


Until next time, Foghorn out!