Almeria birding

Whilst the Bogbumper was running around southern France with Graham 'The Cat' Catley and Kev 'Pinky' du Rose, I was enjoying the sun and wind of southern Spain.

99 species in three and a half days included three lifers as well as catching up with a few less-than-familiar species.

Black-bellied Sandgrouse

The star of the show. Sightings of the 'gravel-chicken' included a flock of 21 birds wheeling about and on distantly on the ground. This male was one of three (two males and female) I managed to get close enough to for a record shot of these very wary birds.

Cabo de Gata Natural Park

A wonderful bird-filled landscape.

Coastral strip of Cabo de Gata Natural Park


Thekla Lark

I struggled to find many Crested Larks away from a few urban areas. Theklas tho were everywhere, usually in small parties of between 4-12 birds.

Cacti


The famous 'plastic'- home to growing tomatos, strawberries, etc

The main plastic area is around Almeria itself. Go north in to the Natural Park around Agua Armaga and its just wonderfull bumpy country with hardly a plastic sheet in sight and stuffed with birds! Bonelli's Eagle, Lesser Kestrel, Blue Rock Thrush, Black Wheatear, Southern Grey Shrike, Sardinian and Dartford Warblers, etc, etc . . .

Las Salinas near Roquetas de Mar

This area lies south of Almeria and can be viewed from along the north road or the southern (seaward) track (along which a very scared Spotted Crake was seen running!). This area is home to . . .

White-headed Duck - all the males were kipping along the far side!

Very nice to see so many WHDs (even if most were at the far side and asleep!). The main 'lake' area also held many Black-necked Grebe and Common Coot - but no Crested that I could find. Shucks!

Las Salinas with plastic and mountains in background.

These pools were stacked with duck including Red-crested Pochard, Shoveler, Wigeon, and Pintail. A couple of Glossy Ibis put in a flight show as well as loads of Flamingos and Little Egrets.

Audouin's Gulls

Just part of the 138 on the one saltpan.


Lesser Black-backs outnumbered all the other gull species put together and disappointingly no Slender-billed or Med Gulls were seen. A line of Audouin's Gulls in the foreground.

Cattle Egret


Huebro - above Nijar

Ramblas around here were stuffed with sylvia warblers, Blue Rock Thrushes, Black Wheaters - but no Rock Bunts.

View of Nijar from Huebro

You can see the plastic extending in to the distance.

Cabo de Gata


Trumpeter Finch

Sometimes numbering up to 60 birds, Trumps took a bit of seeking out in the strong winds. The area around the cafe (before the lighthouse) seemed to be their favourite haunt.


This bird was sexed as a male on bill colour and his buzzy trumpet song! Fab!

A forest of century plants

A fantastic sight! Definately worth checking as anything and everything can be found perched among the 'branches' including Blue Rock Thrushes, Black Wheatears, warblers - well anything!

Southern Grey Shrike

These were everywhere including several singing males - what a song!

The ground in one area was infested with these attractve beetles

Garden birding rules!

Since I am getting out less and less at present, my garden in particular keeps me sane! Tree Sparrows up to 38+, Reed Buntings 7+, loads of Chaffinches, Goldfinches, daily Sparrowhawk raids, etc - great stuff. Add to this the stuff around the house on the fen, like this evenings couple of Merlins, Short-eared, Barn, Tawny and Little Owls - I don't really need to go far for my fix.

Blue Tit enjoyaing a bath


Great Tit come down for a drink


Treep and Piedy Wag at the bird bath


The Treeps have now taken to fat balls! Here four Treeps and a House Sprog battle for the fat while a Toadsnatcher nervously looks from the bush behind


Last week a Moorhen took up residence in the garden!


The Moorhen takes a liking to the sombrero

End of year review

Well, not the birding year I had hoped for with far less local birding done.

But . . . I still managed nine Peterborough area ticks - Great Northern Diver (River Welland, Nov), Red-necked Grebe (Ferry Meadows, Dec), Slavonian Grebe (Ferry Meadows, Dec), Tundra Bean Goose (Bassenhally Moor, Dec), Red-breasted Merganser (River Welland, Apr), Temminck's Stint (Nene Washes, May), Wryneck (Langtoft, Oct), Pied Flycatcher (in the garden, Aug) and Red-backed Shrike (Prior's Fen, Sept). These take me to an end of year standing of 217 species in the Peterborough area, and joint second in the local listing stakes!

. . . and 11 new species added to my garden list! In order, Curlew (Mar), Great Crested Grebe (Mar), Oystercatcher (Apr), Little Grebe (Apr), Quail (Jun), Red Kite (Aug), Pied Flycatchr (Aug), Grey Wagtail (Aug), Reed Warbler (Aug) and Pink-footed Goose (Nov) [and doesn't include the female Pintail I had flying along the drove when I was heading towards Tebbitt's Bridge and I watched it fly right over my house!]. This saw me ending the year on 103 species, and top of the local garden bird league! My garden year list ended on 93, two up on last year. Likely species I missed this year (which I have had in the past) included Whooper Swan, Gadwall, Wigeon, Redshank, Green Sand, Stonechat (recorded nearby on the fen) and Blackcap. Number of species seen each month - Jan (49), Feb (49), Mar (52), Apr (58), May (63), Jun (60), Jul (52), Aug (61), Sept (53, Oct (52), Nov (56) and Dec (56).

My British List grew by three species - Western Sand (Dorset, September), Cream-coloured Courser and Ovenbird (both Scilly, October). I failed to get to the Fife Masked Shrike which was a bit of a bummer.

I did get to some great birding destintations during the year, many of which were as a wildlife tour leader for Speyside Widlife - Camargue (Feb), Lesbos (Apr), Scilly (May and Sept) and Shetland and Orkney (July). I did however manage one of my dullest ever east coast birding days on the Lincs coast in Oct - the same day Yorks and East Anglia was leaping with stuff!

Overseas bird of the year - Eastern Bonelli's Warbler, Lesbos (Apr)
British bird of the year - Ovenbird, Scilly (Oct)
Peterborough birds of the year - Red-backed Shrike, Prior's Fen (Sept) and Wryneck, Langtoft (Oct)
Garden bird of the year - Pied Fly
My places of the year - a part from my beloved garden and Scilly - Rousay (Orkney) and Lesbos

More grebe ecstasy

Well, I may have been 100 miles away in Yorkshire undergoing some post-xmas relaxation with family, but that wasn't gonna get in the way of my Peterborough area tick no. 217 - a Red-necked Grebe at Ferry Meadows CP. Alerted by my ever thoughtful friends, the Natural Stone and Bogbumper, I hot footed it back down the A1 this afternoon to eventually secure my latest area tick to take me equal with the Natural Stone (and both of us only seven species behind area leader Martin Coates!).

A couple of record shots snapped in the fading afternoon gloom.

Red-necked Grebe Ferry Meadows CP

Slav Grebe falls at last!

Since moving away from the Ortons two years ago, it takes something really good to get me back to old haunts such as Ferry Meadows CP, and what better than a P'boro area tick (no. 216 - hot on the heels of 215, Tundra Bean Geese at Bassenhally Moor last Friday).

Slavonian Grebe Ferry Meadows CP.

Found by Nene Park Trust stalwart Terry Daunt yesterday, I was confident it was still going to be present as when these birds do turn up they have a habit of hanging around. So, unlike messers WeedWorld and Bogbumper, I didn't lose my much needed beauty sleep this morning, or fight through the P'boro traffic, but waited on news and sauntered down to FMCP late morning by which time the light was reasonable but the wind was up - can't have everything.

The Slav performed well, ranging from the Sports Centre to the pontoon corner and took a real dislike to dogs and children around the edges of the lake and so decided to spend much of its time in open water rather than fishing along the shallower edges which it tried to do occasionally (until disturbed by dogs and/or kids again!). Oh the joys of urban/suburban birding - not!

Bean, gone, and back again!

On Sat 4 Dec, Bill Meek found a flock of Tundra Bean Geese on the Nene Washes RSPB reserve, but as soon as he got news out, they buggered off! Step in Jonny Taylor - Nene Washes ace bird finder - who relocated them some days alter on Bassenhally Moor.

Peterborough area tick no. 215! Thanks gents.

Tundra Bean Geese Bassenhally Moor.

A rather poor shot in dull light and murk!

Great Northern Diver

News of a Great Northern Diver on the River Welland at Crowland came too late for anyone to get to see it yesterday, so dawn this morning saw WeedWorld and Bogbumper on site at 0700h to spread the good news that it was still present. A much wanted Peterbirder area tick for many of us (and no. 214 for me).

Immature Great Northern Diver



Just look at that bruise on its for'ed!

Long-tailed Duck

A text from the young Bowell informing me that he had just found a female Long-tailed Duck at Welland Bank Pits/Deepings Lake (or whetever it is called now). Having seen the OBP bird back in '99, I wasn't in a mad dash to get to it (for a change!), so wandered up late afternoon to get rather distant views as it fed. Also present the winter Black-necked Grebe, Goldeneye and Wigeon.

Whoops on the Welland

A visit up to Vine House Farm for a meeting (and to collect some seed) had me picking up a single Brambling around the yard. Afterwards, a quick check of hte River Welland north of Crowland and I came across another couple of Bramblings and these two Whooper Swans (adult and imm).

Late Common Darter

Noticing a Common Darter basking in the strong autumn sun outside the office window, I couldn't resist trying to be creative with the strong light. Just look at the amber suffusion to the wings. Unfortunatey, the movement of its jaws as it chomped on a fly doesn't come through on a still shot!

God they're gorgeous

In what was a non-birding weekend, I managed to get to Beachy Head (site tick!) for an hour or so. Despite it teeming with bodies, I was delighted to find a cracking pair of Firecrests feeding together in one group of bushes right by the Beachy Head pub. The male really was a (fire) cracker!

Ovenbird - R.I.P

Ovenbird
St Mary's, Isles of Scilly
Found, Monday 25 October 2004
Died, Thursday 28 october 2004

'Digibinned' using my LEICA Ultravid 8x42s and Nikon Coolpix 995

Alas, it went the same way as most Ovenbirds found on this side of the Atlantic, and the Cream-coloured Courser which also died in care this morning.

Ovenbird! - now we're cookin'

Ovenbird. St Mary's, Isles of Scilly

'Digibinned' using my LEICA Ultravid 8x42s and Nikon Coolpix 995

Just a month a go I was thinking that I might be in for my first ever tick-free year. But nah, birding can be cruel and it can be magic, and running up to today I'd added Western Sand and Cream-coloured Courser in the last few weeks.

Resting on my laurels and thinking I'd seen the best bird I could get to of the autumn, the news of an Ovenbird on Scilly was shattering. Another bird with mythical status!

With a heap of work to get through I worked early morns and late evenings Monday and Tuesday so that I could afford Wednesday in the field. So, setting off at 11.00pm last night, I headed south-west.

I arrived at Penzance in time for a kip before relocating to Tesco for breakfast and to wait for news of the Ovenbird. I hadn't booked a chopper flight as if the bird disappeared (or died!) overnight, I would lose my £87 if I cancelled the ticket. But with an incoming storm already gusting near-gale force, Skybus and the Scillonian III cancelled for the next two days, would there not be a queue of hopeful birders waiting to rush for the few remaining seats at the heliport?

Just after 9.00am news came through that the Ovenbird was still present, so I legged it to the heliport and walked straight on to the next chopper flight to St Mary's. I was shocked to see only four other birders on the flight (and empty seats!) - appen the rough weather had p[ut pay to more traveling down (and it was mid-week after all).

We arrived at the site near Innisidgen, St Mary's at about 10.25am. The bird hadn't been seen since the 9.00am sighting, when it briefly appeared and walked off into ground cover. Rollox! The wind then picked up some more (gale force by now!) and the rain started. And it didn't sop for nearly two hours. If you weren't stood behind a tree, then it was akin to being bucketed with water. It wasn't good!

About two hours later it ceased and within minutes the sun came out - nice, bright and very warm. Many of us spread out to look for the Ovenbird. I soon located it with another birder in a sunny and windy hollow. My first view wasn't what I was hoping for. There, almost flat to the very wet ground, was a sodden bird with both its wings, tail and legs spread and head looking up to the sky. Jeez, I thought it was dead. Then it moved. We called other birders over and the bird, which was probably sunbathing in order to get dry, began to move, but each time it attempted to stand it simply flopped to the floor. The poor sod was knackered!

The assembled birders viewed it as it just sat in the wind and sun, slowly looking to be drying. It was agreed that we would attempt to catch it and stick it in a hat under someone's jumper and warm it up and to get it dry. As one guy was about to clasp his hands around it, it flew weakly back to the area it had spent the last couple of days feeding. It began feeding actively straight away, and in the sun and wind, it soon began to dry out. As it continued to feed, it got progressively stronger and less doddery, but it was always weak and occasionally a gust of wind would topple it over. Its left leg was obviously injured (not broken) as it was stiff and slightly trailing.

There was a collective relief to see the little bugger up and feeding and perking up all the time. Its a horrid feeling watching a bird that is visibly dying right in front of you, so the better it looked, the better we all felt (selfish I know!).

Conditions weren't condusive for scope use, so I improvised and hand-holding my Ultravid 8x42s, I set my Nikon Coolpix to the bottom end of the optimum macro setting and shooting at a max of 1/60th of a sec, I managed these half-decent record shots! People around me were amazed at the results, as I am, at my first ever 'digibinning'.



Just look at that crown!

'Digibinned' using my LEICA Ultravid 8x42s and Nikon Coolpix 995

I watched the Ovenbird for a good while before feeling that I was now missing some birding elsewhere on the island. Heading back up towards Trenowerth Farm and the place was chuffed with birds - Chiffchaffs in particular where everywhere. A Woodcock flew through. A couple of Black Redstarts suddenly appeared in front of me. A Merlin fought the wind overhead. And dozens upon dozens of Redwings bombed around overhead. Wow!

I picked my route for the next two hours, slowly heading towards the airport and making use of as much north-west facing cover (from the gale force SE wind!). The whole Trenowerth area was dripping with Chiffies and I managed a very grey (northern?) Willow Warbler and a Common Redstart to go with my brace of Black Reds.

Telegraph continued the theme. More Black Reds, including 11 along one field edge. Chiffies along walls. Skylarks. Mipits. I noticed everyone else was taking the road back to town, so I thought I would brave the Golf Course. Walking across the first fairway I was blown off my feet! Now that was a first. Wandering around I flushed 19 Snipe and another Woodcock. The sheltered treeline leading down to the club house held a minimum of 39 Chiffies and 9 more Black Reds.

Porthloo was mild (on the sheltered side of the island) and held a single Med Gull and another smattering of Black Reds and Chiffs. I headed through the Incinerator and failed to latch on to the Waxwing or Yellow-browed, but managed to catch up with the Grey Phal on a really wild Old Town Bay. The phal was literally blown out of the water and dumped on to the road so it was picked up and relocated to nearby Lower Moors pool.

A windy Old Town Bay


What a day. Despite the weather, one of the best birding days I've had in an age.

Wryneck - brightening up a dull day!

Returning from Scilly last night, both Katie’s and my euphoria of successfully twitching the Cream-coloured Courser was slightly tempered by news that we had missed a Wryneck on our home turf (found by Martin Coates's dog Sparky). Ouch! Still, we had Mr Creamy Courser under our belts, and Katie had also ticked Short-toed Lark, so life was pretty sweet.

For some time, Brian 'the natural' Stone, Katie and I had arranged some time ago to head out to the coast for a rare day out of area. Our plans were changed slightly in order to start at Langtoft for the Wryneck. With a clearing sky I wasn't too hopeful, but as we left Katie's, Mikey 'world of nature' Weedon called us to say he was watching 'the neck'. top man!

We arrived at the site and from the car we were able to get brief views of the Wryneck only feet in front of Mikey's digiscoping set-up. We quietly got out of the car out of view of the bird, but the bird was spooked and flew into a tree. Some 45 mins later it hadn't returned, so the three of us headed for the Lincs coast as planned.

The Lincs coast is a vastly underwatched area - and for good reason. With Yorkshire (White's thrush, OBP, Pallas's and Yellow-browed Warblers, RB Fly etc) and Norfolk/Suffolk (more Pallas's and yellow-broweds, RB Flies etc) dripping with birds, our anticipation and expectations were greatly heightened. But without good reason. Skeggie to Gib Point was dead! Goldcrests (and not that many) a couple of Chiffies (which I didn’t even see!), a Lesser Whitethroat (which I only heard) and star bird - a Woodcock (seen only by Katie and Brian!) - and that was it.

So, with no birds to look at I suggested heading back inland for another, and better, look at the Wryneck. Agreed. An hour or so later we were back at Langtoft and, driving through the gate we immediately spotted the Wryneck feeding along the kerbstones in front of us! Bloody marvellous! We spent the next hour or so getting closer, and closer, snapping and snapping. What a bloody wonderful creature. I'd seen Wrynecks well in the past, but nothing quite like this! (see Katie's photos).

For Katie's pics click here. For Brian's pics click here.

What a star!


Playing hide and seek


What you lookin' at?


Get in there!


Tongue action


Photos © Steve Dudley
Nikon Coolpix 995 | Leica APO Televid 77 with 20xWA eyepiece

What a creamy cracker!

With Mr Creamy Courser the Cream-coloured Cracker still lingering on the magical Isles of Scilly, the Katie 'Bogbumper' Fuller, Mark 'Wardy' Ward and myself had already secured earlier in the week the last three places on the 07.30h chopper this morning.

The Courser though decided to change its routine yesterday. No longer content living in the sheep fields of St Martin's it moved to the airport on St Mary's. Ouch! Saturday's chopper and plane traffic will be the busiest in weeks, so if it decides to stay around the airport it might get disturbed and shoot off which might take some relocating. Mind you, if it did stay around the airport, it would save us the time and hassle of legging it over to St Martin's.

So, we set off at 22.00h last night and arrived in Penzance at 04.00h this morning and managed a rather unsettled couple of hours sleep before transferring to the airport for our 07.30h chopper flight.

We got in the air five minutes early and arrived on St Mary's 20 minutes later. It was still quite dull and with no other birders likely to be out this early, it was up to us to find Mr Creamy Cracker for ourselves. Half an hours search around the terminal building drew a blank, so we decided to leave others searching this area and headed for the windsock to check the end of the main runway. The choppers and planes were using the other auxiliary runway due to the easterly winds, so it meant that the Giant's Castle end of the airfield was relatively undisturbed. In the howling 40+mph winds we could barely stand up in this exposed area with absolutely nothing to shelter us. We gave the place a grilling and were just about to head for Peninnis when Wardy's pager alerted us that the Courser was viewable from the terminal building! Result!

We legged it back round (very sweaty indeed!) and approaching the terminal building along the Old Town footpath we spotted the gathered birders looking down our side of the airfield. 'There it is!' I yelled 'on the ridge!'. We quickly set up our scopes. Even though the wind was howling and it was still very dull, I decided to get at least a record shot of Mr Creamy Cracker just in case I didn't get the opporuntity later in what was not worsening weather.

After about five minutes the Courser walked over the ridge so we moved up to the terminal building. Wardy mused about wanting to see it in flight, and after five mins, an incoming chopper duly helped as the Courser rose with all the other birds and flew, like an out of control Little Bittern in the strengthening wind, and headed off towards Old Town before pitching down in a grassy field - out of sight!

It had now started to pee down, so we decided to make our way across to Peninnis and look for the Short-toed Lark. Despite passing birders who told us it hadn't been seen this morning, we arrived at its favoured field as it was found - result! And what a star bird - the brightest autumn bird I'd ever seen.

The bird looked as fed up and wet as we were, so we continued around Peninnis picking up a single Chiffie and good views of a rather bedraggled Short-eared Owl looking for some cover, before arriving in Hugh Town and pitching ourselves down in Cafe En Route for a crackin cuppa. We were dripping! Wardy and I stripped off and little puddles formed under our hanging coats, scopes, bags etc. Katie sat there all togged up slowly dripping into her own puddle under her seat!

Refreshed, warmed and a little drier, we telephoned for a taxi to take us back to the airport for another view of the Courser. We watched it for a while in the pouring rain. It looked well and truly fecked off as it huddled down behind a pittasporum bush in a bulb field. It got up a couple of times, ran around on its leggy legs before returning to shelter. Poor sod.

A very wet and miserable Mr Creamy Courser


Two very wet, but happy, dirty twitchers


Well bugger the Courser - poor us! We were pee wet through again, so we made for the airport building and straight to the check-in desk. Although not due to fly off for another three hours, I enquired about an earlier flight back to Penzance and was handed three boarding cards for the next flight - 20 minutes later. Result!

Back in Penzance we made for Tesco for a hot lunch (and free in Wardy's case - another result!) before heading home, arriving back on the fen at 21.30h. Scilly and back in 22 hours. Result!

Photos © Steve Dudley
Nikon Coolpix 995 | Leica APO Televid 77 with 20xWA eyepiece

Solar moler

My little furry friend, Mr Mole, has been causing a bit of a do in the garden. He's taken up residence at the bottom end of the garden and each night burrows around and forms his little hills hither and thither. I wasn't too fussed at first, but when the ground began to get decidedly dodgy due to the many tunnels, and the mole hills just kept on mounting up, I thought it was about time something had to be done (even though the sparrows love to dust-bathe on the dry mole hills!).

Wanting a humane solution to my problem, I searched the web and discovered solar powered mole deterrents - or solar molers! I got mine ordered. It arrived. I unpacked it. I then stuck the solar sensitive top in the garden for three days to charge up the battery, stuck the thing in the most recent molehill (one from the previoius night) and hey presto! Ultrasonic beeps are now being transmitted through moledom and beyond. Success was instant. No new hills for two consecutive nights. Lets hope the solar moler keeps things that way!

My solar moler doing its job with old mole hills behind


Photos © Steve Dudley
Nikon Coolpix 995

Sunflowers @ Farcet Fen

By 'eck! What's this? A field margin strip of sunflowers on the fen. Fantastic!

Sunflower strip on Farcet Fen

Today I decided to take a closer look, and whilst doing so, met Martin, the manager of this and two other such strips on the fen planted for game cover. Martin explained that his small shoot were looking at ways of creating better cover strips for pheasants which not only looked more attractive than the horrible looking traditional maize strips, but were also better for the pheasants and the local wildlife community.

Well I think they've hit on a winner with this. The strips have been planted under the new 5m field margin scheme. Sunflowers and quinoa (a South American version of Fat Hen) have been planted together to provide a wealth of food once the plants have ripened and dropped their seed. Plenty of sun reaches the ground below the bushy stand of taller plants, and the whole place is alive with insects. Whilst I was there a male Yellowhammer was buzzing around the strip.

The winter will be the time to tell if it has worked as a cover strip. As long as the plants remain standing and provide decent cover through to Jan/Feb time, then it will be deemed a success. Lets just hope all this free sunflower and quinoa seed doesn't take too many birds away from my garden!

If we all go down to Minsmere . . .

. . . we'll see some chuffin curlew! Well,lets admit it, apart from a whacky bill and a great call, I can't see what else curlews have going for them. And to drive for two hours to see . . . er . . . a small curlew? Hey - lets party!

But hold on, whats this? A snake in the grass it looks like!

Adder