Fair Isle September 2015

It's taken me a few weeks to process all of the photographs I took during the last week or so in September whilst birding Fair Isle and mainland Shetland. I journeyed up to Aberdeen on Thursday 17th September along with four guys from the BTO. We were planning to meet another BTO employee and a couple more friends to make up a team of nine birders who would spend the next ten days grubbing about in the hope of finding that really rare bird!
We caught the overnight ferry from Aberdeen to Lerwick and after a 14 hour crossing we disembarked at 0700 on Friday. Lack of a good night's sleep was having an effect but a few northern specialities: Hooded Crow, Black Guillemot and Eider as well as Raven and Great Northen Diver added to the Arctic and Great Skuas seen off the boat livened me up a bit. After loading our gear into the hire car we set off for Sumburgh to look for a Western Bonelli's Warbler which had been knocking about in a dog rose hedge for a few days. We found it sure enough but it was being a devil to see clearly: flitting about in deep cover and giving nanosecond views. I saw the bird five or six times and I bet that if all of the time I saw it was totalled it would come to about a second and a half!
No chance of photographs but there was an obliging Kestrel and an equally obliging Spotted Flycatcher.

Kestrel waiting to catch a Western Bonelli's Warbler

Spotted Flycatcher - Sumburgh

We saw a very late Common Swift near to the lighthouse as well as brief views of a couple of Minke Whales. Other species of note here were Common Redstart and Little Stint as well as a Yellow-browed Warbler. The first of what proved to be a bumper count over the next week.
Our flight from Tingwall was due out around 1500 so after a fruitless visit to Quendale we clambered into the plane to cross to Fair Isle. Well, at least, some of us did!
Arriving on Fair Isle and walking down towards Pund we had great views of a juvenile Pallid Harrier. This was virtually the first bird we saw...and it was a life tick for me. Although it flew quite close I did not have my camera at the ready (let that be a lesson) so no photographs. Its gingery underparts and neck markings: the black boa, in particular, seperating it from juvenile Hen Harrier (which we also saw). The Pallid Harrier was to prove quite reliable for the next few days although I only managed a few distant record shots which are pretty rubbish as this one testifies:

Juvenile Pallid Harrier - Record shot of a distant bird.

The island seemed to be covered with Great Skuas, presumably they had been feeding out at sea and along the cliffs during the day and they were coming back in for the late afternoon, early evening and laying claim to a patch of moorland in the north of the island. We noticed that during the following days numbers would fall during the day and increase again during the evenings. There were so many of these that they were recorded as presnt during the daily log rather than being counted. The same applied to the island's Gannet and Northen Fulmar populations. As well as the Pallid Harrier we also managed to see the island's only Red-breasted Flycatcher which was loitering around the north haven where the Good Shepherd docks.

Red-breasted Flycatcher on the north haven cliff retaining wire.

The following morning this bird had departed and there were to be no more RBFs during the week.
On the Saturday we thought we had had a good day with 3 Yellow-browed Warblers! Twite, a couple of Common Rosefinch and flocks of Snow Buntings kept us entertained as we tried hard but failed to locate a Lanceolated Warbler in any of the ditches that criss-cross the island. A few common migrants such as Willow Warbler, Chiffchaff, Whinchat, Spotted Flycatcher, Blackcap and Wheatear kept us on our toes.

Whinchat.

Our first Barred Warbler cropped up the next day along with a Blyth's Reed Warbler which was duly netted and ringed by the observatory's assistant wardens. Here are a couple of in-hand photographs of this bird but for a more thorough identification discussion see an earlier posting on this blog titled: (unsurprisingly) Identification of Blyth's Reed Warbler.

Blyth's Reed Warbler - Fair Isle Sept 20th 2015

Blyth's Reed Warbler - Fair Isle Sept 2015

On the Monday we split into three teams and spent the day enjoying a 'bird race' designed to see if we could clean-up on the islands birds on one specific day, We saw 61 species, the other teams saw 60 and 61 respectively but we had a flyover Redpoll discounted because we had not nailed it down to a spcies. Between us I think we managed around 68 species and the wardens claimed around 72 species recorded during the day so we did OK. Pallid Harrier, Common Rosefinch, Yellow-browed Warbler and Blyth's Reed Warbler all figured on the day's lists.

Monster Fair Isle Wren!

Common Rosefinch

Dunlin

Fulmar

Juvenile Gannet

Great Skua...and dead rabbit

Jack Snipe...pretending to be invisible.

Lesser Whitethraot and Fair Isle ring

Merlin. Regular on the island.

Proper...real Rock Dove

Skylark...good numbers all week.

Twite...flocks reached three figures.

Northern Wheatear

Yellow-browed Warbler.Over 50 individuals recorded in one day!

Yellow-browed Warbler numbers went through the roof on 21st as over fifty individuals were counted on the island. A couple of weeks later this record was broken as in excess of seventy birds were recorded in a single day. Again there is a seperate posting on this phenomena for those interested.
Cetaceans were regular during the week and we logged more Minke Whales, Orcas, Risso's Dolphins, Bottle-nosed Dolphins and Harbour Porpoise.
Back on mainland Shetland we preferred to have a feast of fish and chips rather than go see a Thick-billed Warbler but more about that anon.

Yellow-browed Warbler influx.

On the 21st September 2015 whilst birding on Fair Isle I was witness to, at the time, a record fall of Yellow-browed Warblers when at least 53 were counted by the warden and his assistants. This record has already been surpassed as a count of 76 was recorded a week later. I was birding with a team from the BTO and we saw in excess of thirty birds during the day. According to the BTO web site this autumn promises to be one of the best ever for them. 'Breeding from the Urals east across Siberia, Yellow-browed Warbler records in Britain and Ireland have been increasing steadily in recent years. The reason for the increase is still unknown, with reverse migration and range expansion all proposed as potential factors.'
Yorkshire, Shetland, Lancashire, Isles of Scilly, County Wexford, Merseyside, Glamorgan, Orkney, Aberdeenshire, Dorset, Lincolnshire, Cornwall, Fife, Cleveland, Norfolk, Gwynedd, Northumberland, Sussex, Conwy, Kent, Angus, Lothian and County Durham are all reporting YBWs today according to RBA! Now has got to be the time to get out and find your own YBW.

Yellow-browed Warbler Phylloscopus inornatus. In Angelica, Fair Isle 2015

Yellow-browed Warbler Phylloscopus inornatus. In Angelica, Fair Isle 2015

Yellow-browed Warbler Phylloscopus inornatus. In Angelica, Fair Isle 2015

Yellow-browed Warbler Phylloscopus inornatus. In Angelica, Fair Isle 2015

Yellow-browed Warbler Phylloscopus inornatus.

Yellow-browed Warbler Phylloscopus inornatus.

And ten shots of a Bonxie.

There were so many Great Skuas present on Fair Isle that they were never counted for the log at the end of each day. They were merely recorded as present. It would have been a difficult task to get a truly accurate count as they tended to be mobile; roaming all over the island and many spent long periods out at sea, presumably terrorising other seabirds. The boggy moorland was the most frequented habitat during the early mornings and late afternoons with birds loafing seemingly everywhere.
I came across one bird tearing a dead rabbit to pieces. It had, what appeared to be, a rabbit foetus at one point and although it picked it up and messed with it a little it did not seem to relish it much and left it on the ground. It was not a pleasant sight but there you go!

Great Skua with something nasty...prsumably a rabbit foetus

...and with dead rabbit.

As the sun sets a Bonxie looks out to sea.

Bonxie...banking!

Great Skua eating a rabbit

Ten Pictures of Fulmar

Just back after a week or so birding on Fair Isle and Shetland. I saw some great birds and had top company and I managed to take a fair old selection of photographs of a number of species. It will take a few weeks to work through them all and I thought I would work species by species. The first completed set is of Fulmar Petrel. There were at least two blue phase birds lurking about the cliffs but they were not in the mood to be photographed.

Fulmar - Fulmaris glacialis

Birding Islay and Skye.

We have just had a couple of weeks visiting Islay, Jura and Skye. Both the birding and the distillery visiting were good. Eight distilleries on Islay plus one each on Skye and Jura as well as a couple of breweries kept me occupied when the weather was not good enough to go birding. To be honest the distilleries kept me occupied when the weather was good enough too.
Over 100 species recorded including White-tailed Eagle both on Islay and Skye, Golden Eagle on both islands; Hen Harriers on Islay and at least seven Corncrakes on Islay, particularly around the RSPB reserve at Loch Gruinart. Redwing and Whooper Swan were good to see only a week or so from 1st of June; Black-throated, Red-throated and Great Northern Divers were all fairly frequent; Northern Wheatears, Meadow Pipits and Stonechats seemed to be everywhere as were the expected Hooded Crows and Ravens. A flock of 26 Red-billed Chough on north Islay was the largest flock I have ever seen. Twite were, as expected, fairly common.
We had a remote cottage just north of Uig on Skye and from the window we had regular sightings of both eagles as well as auks, Gannets, Fulmars, Gulls , Common and Arctic Terns, Shags, Eiders and Red-breasted Mergansers as well as over a dozen Great Northern Divers. Raven, Hooded Crow, drumming Snipe, flocks of Twite and breeding Wheatear, Stonechat and Meadow Pipit all seemed to be just outside the front door.
The whiskies were superb!

Black Guillemot

Great Northern Diver

Hooded Crow

Northern Wheatear on broken gravestone.

Red-breasted Merganser

Typical Stonechat picture!

Flock of Whimbrel
 

Raven
 

Birding Thetford

The day before yesterday I drove down to Thetford in Norfolk to spend a day birding with my mate Paul Stancliffe. The plan was to drive down in the evening, drink beer and whisky that night, get up early the next day (!) and have a day birding Lakenheath RSPB reserve. That plan was scuppered before I set off as news came through that the RSPB had closed the reserve for two days due to expected high winds. Presumably they were more than a bit worried about trees blowing over and crushing your optics...or worse. So we decided to stick pretty much to the beer and whisky bit but just do a bit of local birding around Thetford before the gales and torrential rain arrived. According to the Met office this was expected around one o'clock in the afternoon.
On Tuesday I set off and decided to call in at Twyford Woods in Lincs. to have a look for both Grizzled and Dingy Skipper butterflies as these are pretty much a certainty at this site in early May. But obviously not when the wind was gusting at around fifty mph, the rain was coming in in horizontal sheets and the skies were leaden. I spent three hours waiting for the weather to improve, got a photograph of a Butterfly Glade sign to remember the place by and a picture of a weird tower in the distance and then gave up. I did hear my first Cuckoo of the spring though and it sounded very much like Chris!

Clear and obvious sign indicating good place for butterflies. No butterflies in high winds, rain and general miserableness!

 Not a bird or butterfly to photograph so, in desperation, I resorted to taking photographs of anything that I thought worthy and this big tower was about as good as it got!

Great big tower thing near Twyford Woods. Water tower? Something to do with the old airfield? Used for shooting deer/pheasants/rabbits? Perhaps a butterfly observation tower!

Back onto the A1 to be confronted by " Long delays between junction 17 and 15." There had been an 'incident' and traffic was at a standstill so I headed off into unknown territory before junction 16. The Sat Nav took me through more fens, villages and hamlets than you could shake a fair-sized stick at but I did manage a couple of ropey photographs of a Red Kite battling with the wind in a village called Piddle-Down-The-Drain or some such.

Red Kite in the village of Piddle-Down-the Drain, Cambs.

Same bird coping better than me with the wid.

I arrived at Thetford around four o'clock and had a wander around the rivers looking for otters but there were none to be found so I took a stroll down to the BTO reserve at Nunnery Lakes. The wind had dropped, the sun was shining and there were at least seven species of warblers singing. Three species of hirundines and Common Swifts were hawking insects at various heights over the lakes and a muntjac deer took a look at me as I sauntered along. Not much from the hide but this Curlew stopped by for a quick bath.

Curlew from the hide at Nunnery Lakes

This bird was present for nearly a minute!!!

The beer and the whisky went as planned - very moderate, sensible and proper grown-up adult like approach adopted and so we were out and birding by 0800 the following morning. We racked-up the first 40-50 species at a lake, the name of which I have forgotten, not too far from Thetford. The most interesting birds were an adult and a first-winter Yellow-legged Gull, both too far away for photography, but which were accompanied by an adult Herring Gull for comparison. As far as photo opportunities went I could have taken pictures of, literally, hundreds of Mallards or a Pied Wagtail. The wagtail won and nothing else came near even though I was using a 400mm lens on a cropped sensor Canon 7D MkII.

Pied Wagtail.....near Thetford!

Next stop was a site not too far away for Nightingales. This was a small site comprising mainly, gorse, bramble, hawthorn and dog-rose and although it was close by the road and seemingly popular with dog-walkers we heard three singing males and had decent views of two birds. I even managed a few reasonable shots of one of the birds delivering its song. This is a species that, I think, is better heard than seen. I can stand around for hours listening to these birds.

Nightingale singing. You can tell that we are near the BTO HQ in Thetford...the bird's been ringed!

Whilst at this spot I managed to get photos of two species of butterfly: Orange-tip (female) and Small Copper but there was no sign of Green Hairstreak which is known to frequent the area.

Finally...a butterfly. Female Orange Tip

And another... Small Copper.

We set off for Lynford Arboretum before the threatened downpour - so far it had been dry and sunny, and very  warm at times. Fortunately Paul was suitably dressed in Wellington Boots. waterproof over-trousers, two fleece jackets and a Jack Wolfskin waterproof overcoat. So he was not feeling the heat at all!! Still he was ready for the deluge. At Lynford our aim was to see Firecrests and take some award winning photographs. We did indeed see a couple of Firecrests eventually when the wind stopped howling through the tree tops long enough for us to hear the calls. Photographs were never going to be. We were in a wood, it was dark, the birds were high in the trees, the trees were coniferous and dense, the birds were minute and everything was blowing about...forget photography. A better bet was a Chaffinch that dropped down to take at look at my camera lens.

Chaffinch... clocking me clocking him!

The weather forcasters were certain that the wind and rain would get really bad - that's why Lakenheath was closed. It had remained warm and sunny all morning but the wind was getting stronger and the skies were getting darker so we called it a day around twelve. On the way home it didn't rain once!
P.S.  check out Paul's new book here: http://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=nb_sb_ss_i_1_9/279-7893031-7606964?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=bto%20guide%20to%20british%20birds&sprefix=bto+guide%2Caps%2C146

This is the brand new Collins - BTO guide to British Birds. This is volume one which deals with the commoner birds. Volume two, which tackles the rarer and vagrant species, is due in the summer.