Been busy...

Wednesday dawn

*Only* one Wryneck this year...

When a man (or woman) is tired of Wrynecks, he is tired of life

Ringing tick - a Greenland Wheatear. Big bugger

Kingfisher...

One of three Water Rails, this one hatched earlier this year

And another the same age

Female Mallard

Wing of male Mallard

And a female Blackcap with funny wings. New feathers growing seemed OK though

Flamborough Head

I've been on holiday in East Yorkshire for a week. We stayed in glamorous Flamborough, on the sticky-out bit halfway up on the right-hand side.

The birds were alright, though. There were tons of migrants early on - Goldcrests and Redwings were in every bush and every scrap of hedge - but they all cleared off by Wednesday. But not before we'd seen two Pallas's Warblers (Darren found one of them) and a Yellow-browed on Flamborough Head.

However, I won't dwell on our two failed attempts to see the Dusky Warbler at Scarborough, or the way things went really rather quiet after midweek.

There were other compensations, however... watching two Roe Deer jump a barbed wire fence; seeing the last Gannet chick of the year still sitting fluffily on the sheer cliff at Bempton; a skein of Pink-footed Geese arriving from over the sea; a handful of Ring Ouzels (including one picked up dead near the lighthouse); watching a Jack Snipe try to land in a gorse bush, a Redstart and a small flock of Bramblings in the hedge right outside our window.

Migrant Wheatear at North Landing

This first-winter male Redstart appeared in the hedge outside our luxury accommodation. The chalet, I mean

And this was the first Brambling I'd ringed!

Here's one Mark caught earlier... a Lesser Whitethroat, possibly of the central Asian race halimodendri

Here's the lighthouse

And the cobble beach at South Landing

Flowers on a bench at t'North

Thornwick Bay

Dawn

Revisited Forge Valley Woods, where I saw my first-ever Nuthatches 20 years ago!

Somehow, these jokes have raised a lot of money for charity...

Lovely decor in the chalet

You'd think they could at least spell YORKSHIRE correctly

photos taken with Canon EOS 30D, EF 300mm f/4L IS USM or Canon Powershot A640

Porthgwarra

Cliffs at Porthgwarra

Wheatears

Heather

Something weird growing over the Gorse

We paid more visits to Porthgwarra than any other site. The birds were good (including Choughs and Yellow-browed Warbler, plus lots of Wheatears on the moor top) but the cafe was very handy, too...

digiscoped photos taken with Nikon Coolpix 995 + Leica Apo Televid 77 with 20x eyepiece

[Finally in] North Wales: Day Three

Male Wheatear displaying, Horseshoe Pass

Female Wheatear feeding

Slate quarry

Pied Flycatcher investigating possible nest-hole, Coed Hafod

Coed Hafod

digiscoped photos taken with Nikon Coolpix 995 + Leica Apo Televid 77 with 20x eyepiece

Spotshank and Wheateater, and rediscovery of Sparklehorse

It's been an interesting day. It didn't start promisingly, since the Ring Ouzel wasn't seen again after the early morning. But we had a phone call from Will Bowell mid-morning to say that Josh Jones had found a nearly summer-plumaged Spotted Redshank at the bizarrely-named Grummit's Scrape.

Managed to get out at lunchtime (first piece of lunchtime twitching since passing driving test). When Dr Weedon and I turned up, there was not a lot to be seen, and certainly no Spotshank. We were despondent and on the verge of leaving the hide when we heard a 'chewit!' Soon enough, the dusky beauty popped out from the edge of the scrape and it showed fairly well until we left.

I took some hasty pics but they're abysmal. If you want to see them, click here and here. But Josh's are much better.

After work I went down to Ferry Meadows, since it was such a nice evening. Had a wander around the scrubby parts of Coney Meadow, where I attempted to digiscope singing Willow Warblers. I had a couple of near-misses: click here to see one. The WWs were fantastic. It seemed like there was one singing from the top of nearly every hawthorn bush. Of course, they all dived for cover as soon as I thought I could get a picture of them...

As I walked out of the scrub towards Lynch Lake, I glimpsed something on top of a post, which turned into a smart male Wheatear. He vanished initially, until I rediscovered him lurking by the narrow-gauge railway. I got a half-decent photo (after some sharpening). Unfortunately, digiscoping was curtailed because of some chav wantonly kicking a football between me and the bird, flushing it. Oh well...

I'd forgotten how much I love Sparklehorse. Highly recommended.

What's in my CD player: Distorted Ghost EP - Sparklehorse