Texel Away Day!

After delaying our trip to Texel, North Holland until today due to the recent strong winds, we couldn't have asked for a more rewarding experience now we've finally arrived, we were certainly in the right place at the right time!

We arrived at Den Helder for the 9.30am ferry oblivious to what lay ahead. We did have our suspicions however that something was going on when around 80% of the people boarding were lugging scopes, cameras & binoculars.

Shortly after pulling out for the short 20 minute crossing I took the opportunity of tapping up a couple of 'Dutch Birders' for some local knowledge, always handy to have. The two guys I chose Marco and Fred turned out to be two of the nicest guys you could wish to meet and so our adventure began.

We were invited to accompany them on a trip around the Island and with their finger on the pulse receiving up to date information via birding friends, we were soon on the trail. Our first bird of the day was an amazing Caspian Plover, (pictured above) seen within a small group of Golden Plovers, distant at first but then some good views, a major twitch for Holland, only 2 in history and the main reason for so many birders! In fact Marco commented on the fact that all the top birders of Holland were on Texel today to see this amazing visitor from Russia.

Shortly after leaving and driving for approximately 10 minutes our second major of the day was an American Golden Plover, this time with immediate good views and once again in amongst a group of Golden Plover foraging on a ploughed field. After coffee and having enjoyed more views we were on the road once again picking up a good number of wildfowl and waders, which included Green Winged Teal, Barnacle Geese, Avocet, Snipe, Dunlin and Greenshank.
We arrived at our next destination with Marco and Fred leading the way and another delight in the form of 4 Ross Geese, the smallest of the three varieties of white geese that actually breed in North America. A trio of lifers for both myself and Alan Lunn who is also on the trip with me.

Still trying to catch our breath and stopping a short while to look out to sea, where we had Eider Duck and Rock Pipit on the shoreline, our attention was suddenly drawn inland with the amazing site of a Peregrine actually attacking a Common Buzzard, who under pressure gave it up and came down to earth with a bump, I'm happy to say unscathed.

Our amazing day continued as we made our way up to the North West of the Island and to De Slufter, an area where the heath land meets sand dunes. Upon arrival 4 Snow Bunting made off to the west and there within yet another ploughed field at the base of the dunes were 50+ Shore Larks, their unmistakable yellow heads bobbing up and down behind the soil mounds. After enjoying the Larks for a while Marco recieved yet more information and we were suddenly off in search of a reported Yellow Browed Warbler, our first and only failure of the day! At this point Marco and Fred departed for the 3.30 ferry as they had a long journey home, Fred not living that far from the German border.

After a well earned respite we had a final drive down to the far south of the Island where we had some excellent views of many waders including Knot, Grey Plover, Ruff, Ringed Plover, Redshank and Bar Tailed Godwit, plus at least 50 Avocet, numerous Wigeon and many Brent Geese. Our final hit of the day before departing for the 6pm ferry were 4 amazing Bearded Tit!

What an astonishing days birding with 79 species and our extreme thanks must go to Marco and Fred, plus my best mate Dave a non birder, who is fast becoming interested, who did all the driving. We'll all certainly sleep tonight!!

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American Golden Plover (left) Ross Goose (right)

All pictures featured in above post are library pictures & birds in summer plumage!

Netherlands So Far!

Well where do I start! I suppose the biggest factor of this trip so far has been the gale force winds we've been experiencing since our arrival on Thursday evening.

A trip to the North Holland coast on Friday was a memorable one but for all the wrong reasons. We arrived at the Dunes near Zandvoort in a driving northerly wind with gusts of over 50mph, which was literally blowing sand directly from the shore into our faces.

Having had the briefest of attempts to locate any birds braving the conditions along the shoreline we retreated to the relative calmness of the nearby Zandvoort Reservior.

The 4km walk was extremely pleasant and bracing during which the only birds encountered in flight were several flocks of Fieldfare & Redwing, plus a brace of Common Buzzard, all battling away against the extreme conditions. We also encountered a huge amount of sheltering Coot, with several Great Crested Grebe within, but the highlight of the day were some excellent views of Roe Deer and Fox. We ended the day as darkness descended with bacon & pineapple pancakes at the nearby hostelry.

This morning, Saturday 17th, we were awake at 5.30am to assess the possibility of an excursion to Texel Island, the highlight of our trip, but the wind still a strong northerly, persuaded us to leave Tezel until Sunday when the conditions are set to be more conducive for such a venture. Instead we headed inland to visit Hoge Veluwe National Park, approximately 55 square kilometers in area near Arnhem, consisting of heathlands, sand dunes & woodlands and the possibility of Crested Tit, Hawfinch and Raven.

We spent the day driving & walking various locations, fortunately with some better results from our previous days excursion. Although once again we were very surprised at the lack of birds seen, only 24 species, our days birding list included 8 Raven, 2 Great Grey Shrike, (photographed above by Alan Lunn), a lone Hen Harrier, 5 Common Buzzard and a Raptor species, possible a Merlin which whizzed by too quickly for a definite recognition, we also listed 20 Barnacle Geese on the journey home but no Crested Tit or Hawfinch.

Tomorrow its Tezel no matter what and as I write this post the conditions are perfectly calm!!!

More Migrants

A frosty and somewhat foggy start to my usual Tuesday trip to Brandon but with some excellent birding in superb autumn sunshine.

No major rarities on site today, having missed yesterdays visit by 4 Whooper Swan, (can you believe my phone had no signal!!!) but great numbers of wildfowl on the pools and some substantial movement.

My first large flock of the day was circa 75 Jackdaws heading south over Newlands, easily identified in the early morning mist by their unmistakable clucking.

The River Pool Hide produced 2 Water Rail and over coffee in the big hide some 250 Greylag, 12 Snipe and fair numbers of Wigeon, Shoveler, Teal, Tufted and 4 Gadwall accompanied by a female Pintail. A short while later 5 male Pochard flew in to join 5 females who we'd spotted earlier from the Wright Hide.

Some maintenance work was required today on several of our Barn Owl boxes and during our travels across the reserve we were delighted to see several large flocks of Redwing, literally dropping in over New Hare Covert, numbers by the days end were around circa 200. Skylark, 7 in number, were also recorded and a single Rook overflew, common enough but a very rare visitor to Brandon.

Also in the autumn sunshine I recorded a single Small Copper and 2 Small White Butterfly, plus a number of Migrant Southern Hawker Dragonfly (pictured).

After the other guys had left I ventured back to the main hide alone for a final wind down and was lucky enough to pick up on a single Black Tailed Godwit, which dropped in on Willow Island for a brief respite, before making off to the west. A really enjoyable day which also included single counts of Mistle Thrush, Chiffchaff and Grey Wagtail.

Today has set me up nicely for my departure on Thursday to Holland and in particular Tezel Island for more birding!!

Redwing Influx.

I felt a quick post was necessary today regarding this mornings visit to Brandon Marsh.

A lot of talk now turns to our winter visitors and watching Autumn Watch on the BBC this Friday there was a lot said in relation to the imminent arrival of Redwing. Indeed I myself went in search of Redwing, Fieldfare, Siskin and Redpoll during Fridays visit and produced a number of Fieldfare and possibly several Redwing in flight.

However, this morning there can be no mistake as a group of us regulars recorded no less than 103 Redwing as several flocks were seen making their way across the reserve. Certainly no doubt then in my mind that these great looking birds have arrived back in force.

Home Turf!

An early morning visit to Brandon to start with on a totally bitter day, good job I'd opted for my thermals!

By the time I arrived at East Marsh Pool for coffee I'd listed Bullfinch, actually my 1st bird of the day, plus Cettis Warbler, Pied Wagtail, the usual Blue, Great & Long Tailed Tits and on route through New Hare Covert I'd also heard a couple of Greenshank calling. Another underrated bird in my opinion that seems to have done extremely well at Brandon this summer is the Jay, a pleasure to see and of course at this time of year nearly always with an acorn in it's mouth ready to bury, I recorded 8 today!

The Pool yielded nothing out of the ordinary and no sign of the Black Tailed Godwit seen over the last few days. However, Teal Pool had the 2 Greenshank I'd heard earlier and a visit to the Carlton Hide produced Water Rail, Kingfisher and Sparrowhawk.

I thought it was about time that I made a real effort to locate Siskin, Fieldfare and Redwing on the reserve and so visited several locations where I knew the first birds of this autumn might be. No luck with Siskin but I did manage 3 pockets of Fieldfare over flying the reserve 4, 3 and 15 respective and it's possible that several of the 15 may have been Redwing, but no doubt the bulk were definitely Fieldfare (library Picture), which goes down as my bird of the day!

After Brandon I dropped in at Napton Reservoir and was shocked by the further devastation of the vegetation around the parking area. This site is being brutally managed by the Environment Agency who should be thoroughly ashamed of themselves! I stood forlorn on the windswept bank for several minutes but did manage, 4 Great Crested Grebe, Cettis Warbler, Little Grebe, Kestrel and a lone Gadwall among the many Coot. A number of Black Headed Gulls, 3 Tufted Duck and a family of 5 Mute Swan were also present.

Having returned to the marina furious with what I'd seen at Napton I decided to have a walk around the perimeter to calm myself down before the rain set in. I was delighted to see that we still have Tree Sparrow on site, plus a Yellowhammer and Reed Bunting managed to send me back aboard somewhat cheered!

Too Complacent?

Since arriving back from my trips to Spain and France I've completed several visits to Brandon Marsh but without any positives on the migration front.

I was sitting in the hide this morning with other members of the 'Tuesday Bunch' on a thoroughly dank and miserable morning complaining of the lack of migrants recently, when the word complacency was uttered!!

Having considered this over coffee, while perusing the 300+ Greylag that had just arrived, the earlier female Pintail I'd recorded and the good numbers of Shoveler, Wigeon, Teal, Gadwall, Tufted Duck and Snipe, I had to agree that I've become quite complacent on my home turf. Oh yes and I forgot to mention 2 Greenshank which have now been with us for several weeks.

All considered, for a site of Brandon's diversity, literally smack in the centre of the Midlands and miles away from any coastline we don't do too badly, in fact we do extremely well. As winter approaches I was also reminded of our returning Bittern, probably more than one actually, and further reminded of our resident Cettis Warblers, another reserve success. In fact by the time I departed this afternoon, among others I had also recorded 2 Raven over New Hare Covert, a lingering Blackcap, 2 Chiffchaff and the usual trio of Common Buzzard, Sparrowhawk and Kestrel.

After lunch we were also treated to a Grass Snake, who entertained us for at least 20 minutes in front of the main-hide and simply couldn't make up his mind whether to swim out to the islands or remain on the bank. All in all an excellent days wildlife and with all that in mind I'm going to give myself a good slap when I get home later and remind myself of what a wonderful place Brandon is!!!

Birding Afloat - France

We arrived in Dijon on Sunday September 20th and met up with our friends aboard their boat Le HoddyDod. Our trip would take us along the Canal De Bourgogne to St Jean De Losne and then onto the River Saone through Auxonne, almost as far as Pontailler-sur-Saone.

Although our trip was primarily a social occasion you can't cruise along any canal or river without the possibility of some good birding opportunities and with this in mind I went fully equipped as ever with scope and binoculars!

Of course birding afloat is no pushover, especially when it's your stint at the tiller, the engine noise and the concentration needed to navigate don't allow time for a detailed observation, particularly as the the French canal's & rivers are still used commercially. The opportunities mainly come when your relieved of navigation duties or moored for the day and you can utilise the time for exploring! That said I already had Great White Egret, many Kingfishers, Common Buzzard, Honey Buzzard and Black Redstart under my belt, the latter of which are plentiful on the roofs and aerials of the local villages.

One such opportunity for exploration came when we moored not long after passing through Auxonne and leaving the wife and our friends to enjoy the fantastic autumnal weather (26C) I made my escape. My walk took me along the towpath side of the River Saone where I discovered an excellent butterfly meadow and several small ponds. My first bird of note during my walk was a Redstart perched on a fence near to open fields, closely followed by male and female Stonechat. I also spent an age trying to photograph one of the many Clouded Yellow butterflies but no matter how many I followed I was unable to catch one with wings spread!
After a while I entered a small copse where I picked up 2 Wood Warbler, recognised by their wonderful song and shortly after reemerging my attention was taken by an Osprey, which followed the river for a few hundred yards before disappearing over the tree line.

The small ponds produced Willow, Reed and Sedge Warbler but no surprises apart from a bird call which I couldn't recognise, when in doubt blame a Great Tit is what I always say!!

Finally, a great week in France was topped by my bird of the week, a Rough Legged Buzzard (pictured), which I spotted hovering just over the tree tops, it's white tail with broad dark band unmistakable. My butterfly count consisted of Clouded Yellow plus Common Blue, Brimstone, Red Admiral, Large White and Peacock.

Unexpected Delight

Having shrugged off a nasty head cold which I picked up in Spain I decided to pay an afternoon visit to Brandon before my departure to France. I didn't really expect much but the sun was shining and it was pleasantly warm for this time of year.

I walked my usual route past Sheepfield, where I managed an excellent view of a Stoat, who sat up on his hind legs checking me out before bounding off into the undergrowth.

After a while in the main hide I was joined by Bob Lee one of the other regulars at Brandon and spent a peaceful afternoon checking out the many Wigeon, Gadwall, Shoveler and Snipe that are now arriving in numbers. Not many Warblers left on site now although I heard several Chiffchaff and Cetti's calling.

The main and unexpected event happened at about 4pm When a major eruption of the pool took place and everything literally took flight. Within seconds an Osprey, (another 1st for me @ Brandon), came from Teal Pool directly over the main hide. The last I saw of him was when he seemed to drop in over the tree line on Grebe Pool. It was a major surprise and ended a perfect birding week. It's off to France for me tomorrow and I must say that I'll have to go some to beat this weeks events!

La Mata Report - Spain

Although my visit to Spain was initially to visit family I naturally went well equipped for any birding opportunities that might arise! I was really chomping at the bit at one stage when Dee spotted an Osprey flying over the villa heading for the Salt Marshes, which are literally right behind her dad's place!

I was rewarded later in the week however with a couple of lifers when Dee and I managed 2 visits to La Mata Natural Park Lagoons just on the outskirts of Torrevieja, on Monday and Wednesday. The reserve has a surface area of 3,700 hectares. Of these, 2,100 are stretches of water, while the rest is taken up by the surrounding areas (1,400 hectares of the Torrevieja lagoon and 700 of La Mata). A conservation project for the rare Audouin's Gull (pictured left) is one of the parks priorities. I'm also delighted that we managed good views of this delightful looking gull and thus my first lifer on the visit was noted.

My second came after a visit to one of the two hides on the reserve when we managed some equally good views of a single Gull-Billed Tern which came in just shortly after our arrival. It's also worth noting that the reserve also boasts an excellent observation tower too, where good views of many Little Egret, Blacked Necked Grebe and the distant Flamingo's can be observed.

Also on our tour of the reserve we managed good views of Crested Lark, numerous in numbers and several Great Grey Shrike were also a pleasure to see. Two excellent days birding at La Mata were also capped with observations of Marsh Harrier, Hoopoe, Little Tern, Mediterranean & Yellow Legged Gull. Within our wader list we had Golden Plover, Avocet, Kentish Plover, Sanderling, Little Stint & Turnstone! For a complete list of our visit Click-here. Were back in the UK now until Sunday when were off to France to spend a week on our friends narrowboat, more birding me thinks!!

Foggy Start!

After an extremely chilly night I woke this morning just before dawn to a fogged in marina and to be honest almost turned over for an extra hours kip!

I made my way to Brandon just before sun up, playing the usual dare with the many rabbits and pigeons on route and arrived around 15 minutes before sunrise.

I took my usual walk past the wind pump, which was eerily still, and on past Sheepfield into New Hare Covert. By the time I spotted JR, who was ringing in his usual spot, Kingfisher in hand, I'd picked up a good number of Bullfinch but nothing more.

Having admired the recaptured Kingfisher, the little chap had been caught earlier in the week, I pressed on to the Wright Hide and a foggy East Marsh Pool. As I scanned through the murk I got sight of a lone Wigeon and had good numbers of Lapwing and Shoveler. Also of mention were 4 Gadwall and at this stage 8 Snipe.

After a coffee I made my way around to the Main Hide, calling in at River Pool and Teal Hide, when JR called to inform me of 2 Green Sandpiper which had just dropped in on East Marsh Pool. The sun by now had cleared most of the early morning fog and it wasn't long before I logged the 2 Sandpipers over my second coffee of the day.

A scan of the many BH Gulls revealed no surprises, that is until I looked across to Newlands and discovered to my great delight a pair of Spotted Flycatchers (Library Picture), enjoying the early morning sunshine, perched on a small piece of dead willow. By the time I'd phoned around my discovery a cameo appearance from a Sparrowhawk seemed to have sent them both into hiding. I did manage a couple more brief sightings but as TJ appeared at the hide around ten minutes later the Flycatchers were gone. However, a lone Water Rail made it's way across the front of the hide which he was lucky enough to see as he entered.

A trip to the Carlton Hide, which was full once more with the photographic community, revealed nothing new but apparently just after leaving a Grey Wagtail dropped in.

I left a beautiful sunny Brandon at around midday with a decent species count which also included 2 Whitethroat , 6 Chiffchaff, 7 Cettis Warbler and a Collared Dove, common enough but scarce on the reserve. I also managed a count of 15 Swallow and picked up a Coal Tit on Central Marsh Path

A few butterflies still around with Comma, Speckled Wood, Small Heath and Painted Lady. It's off to Spain on the morning flight so over the next week it'll be Twitter that will keep my blog updated, as I hope to get some birding in during my stay!