Spurn Weekend Day 2

First full day back at the site where I spent 3 months solid. I got up nice and early, half 5 and was just on my way up to numpties when Steve ran down saying Mick had got Bee-Eater up in Easington and turtle dove at Wetlands. As a result I jumped in the car with Steve and we rushed off to Easington to see if we could track in down on the wires. We could not, which follows the pattern of the bird the previous day.

I decided the wetlands would be a waste of time and instead got a lift back to Numpties where I hoped the bee-eater would go past. There was a steady trickle of swifts moving down over numpties and a few other bits and pieces. It was not pulling up trees but there was enough to keep you sharp whilst seeing some good stuff.

During the morning a reported 3 Grey Herons came in off the sea, though 2 were before I arrived. It was bizzare to see these great big birds which I usually see flying over wetlands or fields, out in the sea coming inland, and made for some more unusual photos of the birds in their habitat.

-Grey Heron

The wind was an absolute nightmare so we were watching from the downwind side of the seawatching hut. It was just as well as otherwise we would have missed some good stuff. Early in the morning Rich Swales picked out a couple of Egyptian Geese flying in the distance, which was the rarest bird recorded at spurn all weekend, but they were distant and seemed to drop down over the ponds, though we heard nothing.

Next I picked up a flock of Canada Geese at the same sort of distance. However, not yet completely familiar with the workings of Spurn I considered them 'just' Canada Geese and kept them quiet, until I mentioned it in passing later to a cry of them being suppressed. Awkward! Given they were now very unusual and I had only got the facial pattern on one of the birds I told Paul that there had been one Canada Goose and 5 other geese sp. but after seeing that a flock of 6 Canadas had been reported earlier in the week it would make sense that they were all canadas. The weird workings of birds at Spurn have caught me out again.

The highlight of the morning for me came a little later on. It all happened very quickly but simultaenously we heard a call that sounded familiar but I could not put my finger on it, and a pair of birds flew past us, the one closest to me was clearly red and a reasonably large finch sp. Had I time I would have got it, but the others there were onto it straight away, Common Crossbill, my third Spurn Tick of the morning. There seemed some confusion that it might have been two Crossbills and a Linnet but we will never know as the birds kept on going over and beyond the buildings at the Warren. I was pretty buzzing after that to be sure.

The same thing happened again not long after, with another call I knew I recognised but could not put my finger on it. This time we picked up the bird much quicker, though it still went through pretty fast, a Siskin, which is only my second for Spurn.

There had been Cuckoos calling yesterday up at wetlands but by late morning we had 3 flying about over Clubleys. Two went back to canal hedge but one did a full loop of clubleys allowing me to get some decent, if not exceptional, shots of the bird in flight.

-Cuckoo

By early afternoon the numbers of Swifts had started to pick up and we were soon on over 1000 having passed through. Other stuff continued to be around, and next on the list was a Hobby that one of the birders had picked up coming in over the Borough Pits. Obviously that's a long way away and I managed no photos of it. It kept diving below, and stayed down for a while before coming back up. It did this a couple of times before moving back out to sea and going south, again at a distance.

The Siskin decided to come back, unlike the crossbills, and did a loop over our heads before heading south again. I was keen to try and grab a photo but caught my camera on my bag, breaking the screen. fortunately no internal damage was done but it does mean I have now broken 2 cameras at Spurn, which is far from ideal.

-Siskin

After 8 hours up at numpties I decided to go for a little walk round the triangle, despite Ian saying it was a big mistake. The wind, of course, kept everything down in the triangle and the only birds I saw were Grey Plover and a solitary Brent Goose (Pale Bellied) from Canal Bank.

-Pale Bellied Brent Goose and Grey Plover

I was thinking to myself that I should have stayed at numpties when the inevitable happened; Pete text me saying that the bee-eater had gone south while I had been away. I was gutted, but felt surprising not bothered. Whilst I had not seen the bee-eater, major bummer, I had always wanted to tick it where I could appreciate it, and not some flyby, so I did not feel as bad as I could have done. That being said, it did not help me when I was being ripped to pieces by the guys when I returned to numpties...

I waited at numpties to see if it would come back, but it did not. I helped Steve count Swifts and in the end there were around 2300 that went through, which is not bad going at all. Another fantastic days birding at Spurn, with 3 Spurn Ticks to boot.

Species List:

Numpties: Egyptian Goose, Gannet, Swift, House Martin, Linnet, Woodpigeon, Magpie, Black-Headed Gull, Brent Goose, Lesser Black-Backed Gull, Sandwich Tern, Carrion Crow, Whimbrel, Mallard, Little Tern, Grey Heron, Kestrel, Jackdaw, Feral Pigeon, Starling, Common Crossbill, Great Black-Backed Gull, Greenfinch, Canada Goose, Collard Dove, Goldfinch, Oystercatcher, Reed Bunting, Skylark, Little Egret, Collard Dove, Common Scoter, Pied Wagtail, Cuckoo, Siskin, Common Gull, Grey Plover, Graylag Goose, Hobby, Tufted Duck, Knot,

Endcliffe Park

So what started as a short revision break to photograph the ducks in Endcliffe park that I may put on my weekly roundup actually turned into quite an afternoons birding, on a small scale. I did find some lovely mallards to photograph but the light was against me and I did not get too many that were sharp. Those that I got I have included here...

-Mallard

So just as I was wrapping up at the third pool a heron decided to come and land on the side on the path less than 5 meters in front of me. And even when I moved to get into a better position it did not mind. I got to watch it poo, throw up its previous meal and then jump in the lake and start fishing, all within less than 10 meters of me (When  it entered the lake it moved back a bit). I managed to get some decent shots too, though the light was against me again.

-Grey Heron

After it rounded some bushes out of sight I decided I really needed to get back. That plan lasted about 5 mins before I stumbled across a treecreeper, which then led me to its nest, in a crack in an old park shelter. I was pleased to have found this and got to watch the adults flying too an fro. The shelter was right next to the path, so I was stood on the opposite side of the path while people wandered by. Some stopped to ask what I was doing and I got to talk to some people about the birds and show them my photos. The photos are really not great, the light had really turned on me, but you get the gist. I reckon that's the first time I have ever found a treecreeper nest, and I should hope to be going back at some point.

-Treecreeper

So my half an hour break actually turned into over an hour and half, but what does it matter when your seeing birds like these.

Dorset Holiday-Day 12: Fort Nelson Royal Armouries, Arundel WWT

Another scorching day and my family decided to take us to Arundel WWT, but only after we had been to Fort Nelson Royal Armouries. When we got there I found that there was a nature reserve across the road, though it was little more than a field so I went to have a look while my family spent the morning at the armouries.

The field had a lot of butterflies but the were all the same species, though they were in excess. These included things like Meadow Brown, Gatekeeper, Large and Small White, But there were other species which were a bit more unusual, not least Marbled White and Small Skipper.

-Small Skipper

-Marbled White

Walking through the field I also found some none butterfly wildlife, though there was a lot less of this unless you counted the 6 Spot Burnet Moths which were once more very common.

-6 Spot Burnet Moth

While I was walking around there was a curious song coming from the grass and I eventually tracked it down to a very menacing cricket species, which Google informs me is a Roesel's Bush-Cricket, not that I regularly record cricket species, but it certainly struck me because of the striking yellow lines behind its head.

-Roesel's Bush-Cricket

On the bird front it was very quiet, with the exception of a couple of Magpies and on the way out I stumbled across a family of Willow Warblers. They were very flighty and I did not get exceptional views of them.

-Willow Warbler

I went to the museum cafe because my mum said that there we were going to have a coffee. While we were there my mum told me about all the butterflies that were on the wildflowers growing inside the museum. There was nothing that I hadn't seen, until during our coffee my dad spotted a Pill Millipede descending the wall of the museum, which is not a bug I can regularly see.

-Pill Millipede 

The journey to Arundel was none exciting except that there was a fire on the road which blocked everything up and restricted out speed at reaching the site. 

I have always wanted to go to Arundel, and when I arrived my first impressions were good, as on the first pond prior to entry there were Broad Bodied Chasers and Black Tailed Skimmers hunting it. The entry was good and we learnt that there were boat trips running, so we decided to go for one of those first before we had lunch and set off round the reserve.

The boat trip was very enjoyable and relaxing. I spotted some baby Tufted Ducks, as well as large families of Canada and Graylag Geese. On the mammal front we were delighted to see a Water Vole swim across the channel, though the delight would wear off as we walked round the reserve. On the Dragonfly front there were Black Tailed Skimmers, and there was another which I reckon was a hairy dragonfly but I did not get a good enough view. The only thing that would put me off that i.d. is that it is very late in their flight season, but apart from that, it ticked all the boxes. On the damselfly front there were Azure and Common Blue but also Red Eyed, but since we were on a boat I was unable to get any photos. For that reason my only photo of that species is from Norfolk 2 years ago.

We had lunch in the wildlife garden but did not really see anything.There was a school trip lunching next to us and that could be partly to blame. After lunch the trip headed off towards the lapwing hide, so we decided to  go to that hide later and instead go to the 'Sir Peter Scott centenary sand martin hide'. On the way, there were some Egyptian Geese on the path.

-Egyptian Geese

The hide was OK in terms of birdlife. There were Moorhens and Canada Geese feeding directly in front of the hide, as well as Mallards, Tufted Duck and Shelduck. There were also a pair of Common Terns on a raft in front of the hide, which were showing nesting behavior but no sign of chicks, despite what the sightings board said. They were quite close though, and they obviously were not too bothered by people who I imagine were often noisy which could have disturbed them from their nest.

-Common Tern

After we had finished in that hide we went back to the two hides we had meant to go to, Ramsar hide first, where there was nothing much except a female Mandarin. The second hide was the Lapwing hide, and it lived up to its name since the only bird in there besides Mallards was indeed a Lapwing.

After those two disappointments we headed to Scrape hide which was the best hide on the reserve, but that really did not say much. There was a good number of species, including Mallard, Shelduck, Tufted duck but also a few Gadwall sheltering from the heat under a tall tree. At the far end of the pond there was a Grey Heron hunting but it was some way away. There were also quite a few dragonflies around, but the only ones close enough to identify were Four Spot Chasers and Black Tailed Skimmer.

-Gadwall

-Grey Heron

We were watching the far dragonflies to see what they were, when a small mass began swimming across the lake. My initial thought was grass snake, and why not. But no, it turned out when I looked at it through my camera that it was another Water Vole, though to be honest I would rather that it was a grass snake.

-Water Vole

After we had finished at Scrape hide we moved on to Reedbed hide. Here there was very little, but there was a very cute family of four well grown Moorhen chicks. The adult bird then mounted a small platform in front of the hide, being very bold and then started looking in, even though we were only about 2 feet away.

-Moorhen

It was the best view of a moorhen I had ever had. After we had finished in Reedbed hide we moved on to the reedbed walk. About half way through the reedbed walk we sat down and were soon surrounded by a small gathering of Moorhens and Mallards, so my dad fished out the crumbs from lunch and started to feed them from our hands. The moorhen though decided that it would rather have my flesh than bread crumbs. 

After that we moved on and were just watching some more moorhens when I noticed that the reeds next to us were moving of their own accord. So I had a peek in and spotted another Water Vole there happily chomping away even though we were only about a meter away. Now the appeal of water voles at this site was beginning to diminish. On the boat, our pilot had told us that the reserve was in a big fence so that no water vole predators could get in with the exception of birds, but it also restricted the voles moving out. So effectively, it was like a big water vole zoo, but you don't really think of it until we start to see them as tame as this.

-Water Vole

We finished the reedbed walk and headed to the waterfalls enclosure. Here there was the only Blue Duck outside of New Zealand and that was quite exciting. After a few mins of watching it though you began to feel sorry for it, alone with only a farm duck for company. It was exciting to see because it is such a rare duck but for the above reason it seemed a bit bitter sweet.

-Blue Duck

We finished by walking back through the pet wildfowl zone and we got to see some large groups of rare wildfowl of the world, as you would expect from a WWT place. Once more though as we were walking over the white faced whistling duck boardwalk, a Water Vole appeared and started swimming across the pond, even though we were almost directly above it.

-Water Vole

I thought the reserve was a big disappointment really, I had expected a bit more. My dad summed it up quite well-Its a great place if you want to see Moorhens, but otherwise. We headed back to the caravan site, but the wildlife did not stop there, oh no.

That evening once more we set off to look for nightjars to see how many we would get. We had to wait a little longer than the night before and for a few minuets we were wondering if they would even turn up tonight when we were suddenly surrounded by churring and we saw one flying right towards us. We soon had 3 Nightjars flying all around us, and once more quite close. This time I had brought the tripod to try and get some photos of when the birds were landed. However, it did not really work as the camera still vibrated while on the tripod. Still I got more amazing views of these bizarre birds.

-Nightjar

So ends our last full day on holiday, alas that there 13 days have flown by so quick. Hopefully, on the way home we will go out on a high.

Dorset Holiday-Day 5: Studland Heath NT

Another day where it was going to be an absolute scorcher. My family were going to Swanage so I got a lift to Studland NT which comes highly recommended by all the sources I had looked at. It is a dune filled heathland with large bodies of fresh water. Its most well known for its reptiles and winter birds but since I did not really rate my chances of finding either of these I decided to just go and see what was there. 

No sooner did I arrive than did I spot my first bird, a Kestrel flew over me. I was moving pretty cautiously with my eyes down looking for sand lizards when I spotted it moving over me. There might have been a nest nearby but I did not find it if there was.

-Kestrel

At first I did not really have a clue where I was going as many smaller paths crossed the main paths and so I followed these into the woods to get to the 'Little Sea' and see what was there. It did not help that my OS map did not have paths that corresponded to the actual paths, but no matter as I eventually found my way around. 

There were quite a few people around wielding nets in small groups and though I tried to avoid them I overheard them talking about dragonflies, so I assume that they must have been surveying dragonflies. As soon as I entered the small wooded section next to the little sea were I surrounded by dragonflies. There were quite a few Keeled Skimmers in the heather, and occasionally there would be a Black Tailed Skimmer too. I also found Common Darter, as well as one Southern Hawker, and that was all in one small space.

-Black Tailed Skimmer

-Common Darter

-Southern Hawker

I found a small path that went down to the side of the Little Sea and here I found a lot of damselflies. These were mainly Azure and Blue Tailed Damselflies. Since it was boggy I also found some Round Leaved Sundews, which had been a pretty regular feature of all the heathlands that I had visited.

-Round Leaved Sundews

I was though, a bit dissapointed by the little sea. I could see a hide opposite but there were no birds on it at all, except perhaps a few Black Headed Gulls. Making my way back onto the dunes I found another Black Tailed skimmer, only this one had just caught a Bluebottle, and seemed content to let me photograph it while it ate it. These are without doubt the best photos I have ever got of this species, but since the only one I have ever found that seemed keen to land. 

-Black Tailed Skimmer

I made my way along the edge of the woodland next to the Little Sea to see if there was an actual major path down to it with a good viewpoint. On my way I saw my first reptile of the day: Common Lizard. I had seen ample tracks in the sand, as well as seen fleeting glimpses, but this one slunk out of the heather and sat down on the path in front of me.

-Sand Lizard

--In mid 2015 I have encountered this photo again and after a quick google search its pretty clear this is in fact a female Sand Lizard, which was a reptile lifer at the time. The gold dots all along it should have given it away at the time, but I guess I just did not click. So here we have a Sand Lizard, reptile lifer at the time. Superb, just unfortunate that I did not recognise it at the time--

I then found a way down to the Little sea, or at least I thought it was the little sea, but it was closed it seemed, unless it went through the reeds at the northern end to join the LS. Either way this pond had more aquatic vegetation than the any of the LS so far had done, and there were more dragonflies here. I could only access it at this little site though, and here there were too many horseflies.

The dragonflies included the species already seen today and Four Spot Chaser. But there were others. There were three dragonflies slightly larger than darters that kept flying round holding territories very aggressively. It was only when they turned to me and I saw their vivid Green eyes that I realised that these were Downy Emeralds, though very late emeralds. Either way they were a new species and so I waited for one to land. And waited. And waited but they just did not seem keen, even despite the presence of an Emperor Dragonfly which was meant to relegate these smaller dragonflies to the waters edge.

-Four Spot Chaser

While I waited I looked at the birdlife on the pond, which was significantly better than it had been anywhere else on the reserve. There were Moorhens and Coots in the reeds, and opposite me there was a flock of Black Headed Gulls being shadowed by a Grey Heron.

-Grey Heron

The highlight of the birds was though a Little Grebe that was fishing at the far corner of the pond. I only just noticed it, as it was keeping its distance from me, but it was the only one I saw all holiday.

-Little Grebe

All this time the Emeralds had not landed, so I decided to have a mooch up the side of the pond and see if there were any others. I wont bore you with the account, but I found no others, and found that a sedge patch had built up between the waters edge and me so that I was unable to actually see the water. In this sedge patch though a lovely Reed Bunting came and landed next to me.

-Reed Bunting

With this in mind I decided to return to where I was. I was building a path of my own around the area with my to-and-fro-ing. The emeralds were still there but they were still not keen to land so I started trying to photograph them in flight. They came really close but moved too quick. I tried to focus on one point and wait for them to come but they kept being a little above or below the point of focus. 

What really struck me beside their eyes was that their tails seemed to be bent at one point. I don't know if this was an injury on the individuals I was watching or a regular thing with this species, but it struck me. Then, I was following one and it came and landed in a bird tree near me. It was a pain as I could not get a good angle on it and so my photos from that landing were poor. However, it soon took off and landed in the heather in front of me. It was not an ideal position, but allowed me to really get photos of their eyes, which were what had really struck me. 

-Downy Emerald

After a bit of Downy Emerald photographing it took off again and once more began to terrorise the other dragonflies that were there. And so that was the new dragonfly species I had been after, though it came from a source I had not expected it being so late in their flight season.

After I had watched the emerald I spotted that an Emperor Dragonfly had landed in front of me and was beginning to oviposite, so I took a few photos. It was looking at me while it was laying so the photos are more striking.

-Emperor Dragonfly

I left that section of the pond to continue exploring the dunes. I kept the woods to my left though and found that it quickly turned into a flooded forest, where the marsh came right up to the edge of the woods. Here the only dragonfly species that was in any real abundance were Black Tailed Skimmers. I found on that had caught a Blue Tailed Damselfly and was sat on a branch happily munching away.

-Black Tailed Skimmer

I soon found the main path again. I decided to cut across the woods via the path to the west side of the reserve to see what was ahead. The heat had become extreme and that was noticeable in the lack of butterflies around. There were a few Meadow Browns and Gatekeepers but otherwise it was very quiet.

Indeed, it was very quiet in all departments on the western side of the wood. I made my way towards the top car park to see what was about up there. The only thing I saw was a lizard scurry across the path, but too quick for anything other than to notice it. I found its tracks though, which was nice to find. It remained the same until I reached the northern section of the reserve near to the beach. Here the sand and heather was replaced by gorse and the birdlife greatly increased. It started when in a dried river bed I flushed a family of Pied Wagtails and a pair of Greenfinches. 

The gorse was well endowed with birds, heathland species such as Linnet, Stonechat, Skylark in song flight and Meadow Pipit. In fact, it was rather like Soil Hill in terms of its birdlife.

-Meadow Pipit

Having said that it was like soil hill, soil hill does not have any Dartford Warblers which were in abundance here. The only issue was that all I could see were their long red tails dissapearing into the gorse or them flying across the path. I headed to the car park to see what was there before I headed back to chase them, as it was very hot for chasing birds. 

On the way I spotted Sandwich Terns fishing on the beach but that was about it. The path from beach to car park was a boardwalk over a well reeded pool, but it was void of wildlife. As a result I headed back to the gorse to see if any dartford warblers would sit conveniently for me. After about 10 mins chasing them I finally found one hunting spiders in a dead gorse bush where I could see all its movements. From here I was finally able to get some record shots that actually look like Dartford Warblers. Not only that but I got a great view of the bird as it was feeding. Eventually after about 3 mins it took off again and dissapeared into more gorse.

-Dartford Warbler

I then returned to the path feeling very satisfied. Only to find once i got there another warbler, only this one was much bolder, it was a juvenile I think, and I was able to get quite close to it. It started hunting at the base of a gorse bush right in front of me and I watched it for some time before it slipped through a hole in the bush to the otherside and I lost it. 

-Dartford Warbler

I made my way back to the car park where I had begun by going down the Eastern side of the wood. There was not much going on, though there continued to be Skylarks singing and a Greater Spotted Woodpecker flew over me. In testament to this fact I have hereby included a photo of a tree...

-A Tree

In all honesty the remainder of the walk was quite limited in its wildlife appeal. As with Arne the day before the late afternoon sun seemed to come early and it had a twilight feeling at around 4 in the afternoon. All the wildlife seemed to have agreed and the only thing I saw on the way back was a lizard scurry across the path. I made my way to where the downy emeralds had been, but it was not a busy now, and there was only one emerald hunting, and it did not stop to land.

My mum text me saying meet up at the car park where I had been dropped off so I made my way that direction. It wasn't until I had joined up with them again that it really got interesting again. I joined my family on the beach and after a few mins of sharing what I had seen I noticed that some of the Black Headed Gulls were bulkier, their heads darker and their beaks darker. I had found some Mediterranean Gulls, only my second time ever, and this time I had a real camera. There were about 5 of them, though there could have been more, but I enjoyed watching them as they made their way up and down the beach hunting in the seaweed. 

-Mediterranean Gulls

Despite it become much quieter later on, this was without doubt the best day of the holiday so far. It was nice so see some unusual birds, and even then I got good views as well as some nice dragonflies and a new species.

So here ends day 5, again with sunburn and various scratches, but well worth it.