14 Mar 22 - A Perfect Level Morning

I had spent the three previous days in Ireland catching up with the Egyptian Vulture and Northern Harrier for my UK & Irish List. It was time to return to the UK. I prefer to catch the daytime ferries back from Ireland, so I can seawatch on the way back. In the Summer & Autumn, there will usually be a few Short-beaked Common Dolphins and maybe a Harbour Porpoise or a Grey Seal, as well as, a few Seabirds. However, I figured it wouldn't be that exciting in mid-March and therefore I might as well I had catch the evening Irish Ferry sailing from Rosslare to Pembroke Dock.

I managed to get a bit of sleep on the ferry, before we were called to prepare to disembark at 00:45. Arriving at this time, leaves a long drive out of Wales in the early hours of the morning. I could have found somewhere to pull the car over for the rest of the night in South Wales, but I had plans for the following morning. So, I carried on until I reached Gordano Services, in the Bristol area. I managed to get an hour & a half of sleep here, until it was starting to get light. After another forty minutes of driving, I pulled into the car park at the Greylake reserve on the Somerset Levels.

It was my first visit to Greylake, but it was a couple of months overdue. On 3 Jan 22, a photographer had published a photo of an odd Duck which was quickly identified as a gorgeous male Baikal Teal. It later turned out it had been there for at least a week before anybody bothered to ask what it was. This is the problem with many Bird photographers, who don't bother to learn about how to identify their subjects. This is a contrast to the Birders, who might still be learning how to get the most out of their cameras, but they generally have good identification skills. In January, I was fully into the start of my 2022 Historic Isle of Purbeck Year List and I never made the journey up to the Levels.

It was a lovely still, crisp and sunny morning, which was perfect weather to visit. I headed straight for the main hide, where there were over five hundred Ducks on a bank running away from the hide or in the water. This included at least one hundred and sixty Teal, four hundred Wigeon, as well as, some Shovelers, Gadwall and Mallards, with more Ducks poorly visible to the left. I asked the two local photographers in the hide about the Baikal Teal, but they weren't looking beyond the first twenty metres from the hide and didn't have any idea if the Baikal Teal was present.

Teal: Males. There were a lot of sleeping Duck in the edges of the reeds

Teal: Male

Wigeon: Male

Shoveler: Male

After five minutes of scanning, one of the Ducks moved to reveal the sleeping make Baikal Teal on the bank. It looking stunning and was closer than normal, according to one of the photographers.

Where's Wally?: This was just some of the mainly Wigeon on the raised bank

Baikal Teal: Wally wasn't that hard to find, once the Wigeon that had been obscuring him had moved out of the way

Eventually, the Baikal Teal woke up and flew a couple of times when the patrolling Marsh Harriers got too close and disturbed all the Ducks. On the second time, the Baikal Teal landed in the water, before heading back to the raised area.

Marsh Harrier: They only passed close to the hide twice, but when they did they flush most of the Ducks

Wigeon: Flushed by one of the flying over Marsh Harriers

Baikal Teal: The Baikal Teal woke up & flushed with the Wigeon, but it quickly came back down onto the water

Baikal Teal: Note, how variable the green colouration in the face is, as the Baikal Teal moves its head

Baikal Teal: It has an interesting head shape when head on

Baikal Teal

Baikal Teal: Finally, it walked back onto the raised bank

It is a great reserve which I will definitely visit again when I'm passing the Levels.

Dabchick

Great White Egret: There were three Great White Egrets further back in the marsh

I stayed for about an hour and a half and left the hide just in time. As I walked back to the car, there was a number of toggers descending on the hide. I was only just starting to use bird hides again after the C19 lockdowns and I didn't want to be in busy hides.

Snipe: This Snipe has just found a worm

Snipe: Sucking up the worm. I love it when I get to photograph a bit of behaviour like this

I later found out that I managed to see the Baikal Teal on its final morning, as it was seen flying off North East in the late afternoon. It wasn't seen again. I was out on the Birds of Poole Harbour bird boats later in March and also at Studland and saw parties of Duck, lift off the water, fly high & leave Poole Harbour on similar clear evenings. So, it looks like they regularly start a migration flight in the hour before dusk.

13 Mar 22 - More Good Birds In Ireland

On the previous evening, I had driven from the Ross's Gull at Mutton Island, Galway to Lough Boora in County Offaly, so I could look for the Northern Harrier that had been there for a few months. Thanks to some Sat Nav problems, it took longer than I expected. But I finally arrived after ten that evening. I got ready for another night in the car, whilst the car was being buffeted by the wind & rain from the front that had started to arrive while I was in Galway. I woke about an hour before dawn & I could still hear the rain hitting the car, as I drifted back to sleep again. Finally, the alarm went off at dawn & it had stopped raining & the wind appeared to have easied a little. It looked like the forecast that it would improve for dawn was right.

I didn't really want to get up, but there was the chance of seeing the Northern Harrier after it came out of roost. Two Cranes flew across the entrance track just as I got out of the car. I was pleased with that, as I wasn't aware that there were any Cranes at Lough Boora. I was parked within a few metres of the bank which overlooked the heath and bog at the Western edge of the reserve. So, I didn't have far to walk. After some time of looking, a Harrier appeared fairly close to the bank, but it was only a Hen Harrier.

Looking North East over the heath & bog

Looking East over the heath & bog

Looking South East over the heath & bog

Hen Harrier

Hen Harrier

Hen Harrier

Over the next hour of waiting I was joined by two British Birders from the North of England. Finally, a second Harrier appeared and it was the Northern Harrier. Frustratingly, it always stayed at the far side of the huge heath. We had views on and off of the Northern Harrier, two Hen Harriers and a Merlin over the next two hours.

Northern Harrier: I won't win any awards for these photos

Northern Harrier

Northern Harrier

Looking back from the bank, there were short grassy fields which held twenty five Whooper Swans, at least fifteen hundred Golden Plovers and my first Irish Hares. It was a superb looking site.

The short grassy fields: None of the Birds were close to the bank & the Irish Hares had disappeared by the time I returned to the car

I was booked on the overnight ferry back to Pembroke. I wanted to be in Rosslare about 19:30 which would have given me well over an hour before the ferry departed. It was now late morning. It was only around a two hour drive to Rosslare, so I had plenty of time. The options were to spend the rest of the day at Lough Boora, or go looking for the Forster's Tern that I had missed twice or head up to Doon Lough in County Leitrim for the Double-crested Cormorant that was showing well there. When I looked at google maps, I reckoned I had the time to get to Doon Lough and still catch the ferry, albeit it was going to be a long drive as I was driving North rather than South West towards Rosslare. I decided to try for the Double-crested Cormorant and see a different part of Ireland to the areas I've seen on previous trips. After a couple of hours of driving I arrived at Doon Lough and the Double-crested Cormorant was perched on its favourite post. It wasn't that close, as it was at the back of the Lough, but at least it was immediately on view.

Double-crested Cormorant: This was only the second Irish record. I saw the only accepted UK record at Billingham back in Mar 89. I couldn't twitch it when it first turned up in mid Jan as I was on an extended trip to Australia & New Zealand. Fortunately, it stayed long enough to allow me to see it

The Double-crested Cormorant didn't move from its post while I was there. After about forty minutes of watching it, I decided to start heading back on the four and a half hour journey back to Rosslare. It was an uneventful journey and I arrived at the ferry terminal with plenty of time to spare. It had been a very successful three day mini-break to Ireland with two UK and Irish Ticks: Egyptian Vulture and Northern Harrier and a good supporting cast of American Black Duck, Ross's Gull, Double-crested Cormorant and my first Irish Hares. It had been a lot of driving, but that was dictated by my main target species and trying to work around the two fronts that arrived while I was there. Additionally, it had been my first foreign trip since the start of the C19 outbreak, which clearly was still a significant risk. I had minimised my contact with other people by travelling at night and sleeping in the car. The trip wasn't over yet, as I had a plan to make the drive back to Dorset more interesting on the following morning. But I will cover that in the next Blog Post.

12 Mar 22 - Much Nicer Than A 70s Memory

In an earlier Post I wrote about my first post-C19 trip abroad to Ireland for the Egyptian Vulture. After seeing the Egyptian Vulture, I drove North from Tracht to The Mullet Peninsula in the dark & found a pull in by the side of Cross Lough about ten that evening. I slept in the car that night. I've slept in cars on so many UK & foreign trips, that it was the obvious option for this short Irish break. This allowed me to arrive late and not to have to look for accommodation & not to lose time for breakfast. Plus, it was a lower C19 risk. After a good sleep that night, I woke at dawn to the alarm & found I was looking at the nicest area I've visited on my nine short trips to Ireland. The Mullet reminded me of the Uist Islands, albeit with more houses, which remains one of my favourite parts of the UK. I'm old enough to remember the bad mullet haircuts from the 70s, hence the title of this Blog Post.

Barnacle Goose: These three Barnacle Geese which flew over and dropped onto the grass close to the car, were a nice start to the day

The view from the 'Focus' Hotel

The reason for choosing to visit The Mullet was to look for an American Black Duck which has taken up residence on Cross Lough. I drove to the Northern end of Cross Lough & started looking for the American Black Duck. It wasn't with the first groups of Mallard in the North East corner, but then I saw a couple of Ducks flying South: a male Mallard and the American Black Duck. They landed at the Southern end of the lake about a mile away. Driving around to the North West corner, I found some picnic benches, which would have been a better place to kip for the night: the disadvantages of arriving after dark at an unknown site. I carried along South to the end of the road, but it was still a long way to where the American Black Duck had dropped in.

The far shore of Cross Lough

Unfortunately, I couldn't see a path that continued along the shoreline & there were a number of barbed wire fenced fields stopping me walking along the lake shore. Equally importantly, there was a flock of Barnacle Geese that I would have flushed had I tried to walk. At this point, several cars arrived, followed by many more to make 24 cars over the next few minutes. It was time for the local park run along the lake shore & back along a track close to the beach. It seemed a good time to move on, given I didn't think I would get better views of the American Black Duck.

Barnacle Goose

Barnacle Goose: While I was looking for a path along the shoreline, some of the Barnacle Geese got jumpy and flew back one field

It was a nice sunny and crisp morning, albeit quite windy. The plan was to spent the afternoon looking for a Ross's Gull near Galway and have another look for the Forster's Tern, that I hadn't located on the previous afternoon. Knowing I had a three hour drive ahead of me, I decided to spend another couple of hours exploring The Mullet before heading South. I drove back to the main road and followed it South. It certainly looks an interesting place and I can see myself returning for a longer trip on a future October Irish twitch. This is a coastline that has a proven potential for American vagrants.

Greylag Geese: Perhaps a wilder origin that the ones that hang around Poole Harbour

Whooper Swan Lookalike?: There were fourteen Whooper Swans and sixteen Mute Swans on Cross Lough, but none were close enough to photograph

The road passed alongside a couple of great looking sandy beaches, both of which had groups of feeding Bar-tailed Godwits. A Grey Seal popped its head up briefly in one of the bays.

The Bar-tailed Godwit Beach

Bar-tailed Godwit

Bar-tailed Godwit

Eventually, the road ran out at the small harbour by the Blacksod lighthouse, where there was a showy Great Northern Diver and a Rock Pipit on the quayside.

The quayside at Blacksod: Albeit with the usual kink that panoramic camera photos introduce

Great Northern Diver: This Great Northern Diver was feeding in the small harbour at Blacksod on The Mullet

Great Northern Diver: It was a lot closer than I tend to see them on my Studland patch

Rock Pipit: This is a very plain looking individual compared to the ones I see around St Aldhelms and Studland, yet it's still the nominate petrosus subspecies

The Blacksod Lighthouse

Tidy fishing gear on Blacksod quay: It's good to see this all tidily stacked as it's easy for birds to get caught in fishing gear

Trees at Blacksod harbour: This could be interesting in October

It was late morning & my time on The Mullet was up. If I wanted to head down to look for the Ross's Gull, I needed to get moving.

Once you get off The Mullet Peninsula, it looks a lot more like the Scottish West coast

Irish Non-military Tractor: In the week before I went I saw many photos on twitter of Ukrainian farmers towing abandoned Russian tanks behind their tractors, that I had almost forgotten that they are also used for normal farming work

I stopped en route to Galway for another look for the Forster's Tern on the coast around Tracht. Unfortunately, it still wasn't showing. I later found out it was frequently a wider area than I was aware & maybe I should have tried to get to the coast at other points. After an hour or so of looking, I carried on driving to Mutton island near Galway to look for the Ross's Gull. There is a long causeway out to the island and the Ross's Gull was roosting on the rocks with Black-headed Gulls, a Mediterranean Gull & a Sandwich Tern. It wasn't close. But the good thing is it wasn't possible to leave the causeway, so at least they weren't going to be disturbed by a selfish photographer.

Hooded Crow: I don't normally think of them feeding on seaweed, like this one was doing on the Mutton Island causeway. But Corvids are very good at adapting to their surroundings

Ross's Gull: Only the fourth one I've seen with none to this point being close. Fortunately, the 2023 Dorset individual proved more photogenic

The wind had strengthened significantly by the time I had reached the Ross's Gull site. The overnight weather forecast was looking rough, with stronger winds & rain as a front arrived. However, it was also forecast to have cleared through by dawn the following morning. This looked more hopeful for the following morning. I decided to driving across to Lough Boora to look for the Northern Harrier that had been there for a few weeks. It should only have been a bit over an hour to complete the drive, but the Sat Nat failed me. It has built in maps for the whole of Europe, but many of the smaller place names are in Gaelic. I had problems matching up the Sat Nat with Google Maps & the RBA directions and this was the first time the Sat Nav failed me & left me in a village about ten miles from where I needed to be. Eventually, I had to give up on the Sat Nav & switch to Google Maps, but I ended up approaching Lough Boora from a set of very small minor roads. Eventually, I found the site & got ready for another night in the car, whilst hoping the wind & rain would easy by dawn.

11 Mar 22 - Finally A Short Trip Abroad

In Feb 18, I started the first part of a three month trip abroad, starting with a 3.5 week trip to Colombia with my late mate Brian Field on a Birdquest trip. When that ended, I headed down for two weeks of Birding in Chile on my own, before travelling to Ushuaia a few days ahead of the Atlantic Odyssey & West African Pelagic on the expedition ship Plancius which ultimately ended up back in Holland after seven weeks on the ship. I had a short minibreak abroad that Autumn on a Cetacean watching ferry trip to Santander & haven't managed to get abroad since then.

A new contract means I wasn't able to consider any foreign trips until Apr 20, when I was due to go on a private trip with some mates to Vietnam. Further trips were planned for Autumn 20 to Spring 21. Then C19 came along & blew all those trips out of the water. None are close to happening given the C19 situation & my cautious approach to C19.

But on a positive, my contract kept getting extended & this allowed me to save enough to be able to take early retirement at Christmas 21. The early retirement has given me to opportunity to go Birding every day so far in 2022 & it will allow me the opportunity on long distance twitches to not have to race home straight away. In Nov 21, a Northern Harrier turned up at Lough Boora in Ireland. There have only been ten accepted UK records up to the end of 2019 and no mainland twitchable records since the species was split from Hen Harrier. The majority of those records have been on offshore islands or single day sightings including the only Dorset record, which my mate Pete Moore jammed in on Portland. There have been a further eight Irish records. As the Northern Harrier settled down for the Winter at Lough Boora, I vaguely considered a trip, but the rising C19 rates didn't make it attractive. I reconsidered it at the start of 2022 when I had more time available given the early retirement, but I still was still concerned about travelling to Ireland due to C19. In late Feb 22, the mobile Egyptian Vulture was finally pinned down in Ireland and within an hour's drive from the Northern Harrier. Initially, I still wasn't tempted despite two British & Irish Ticks.

I have been across to Ireland on eight previous trips over the years since the 1988 Sapsucker twitch to Cape Clear. All the trips have been good fun & all, but one, have been successful. Having heard back from friends that the paperwork to travel to Ireland was straight-forward for C19, I looked into the logistics of an Irish trip. In the past it would have involved trying to coordinate a trip with some mates for a short break as foot passengers from South Wales & a hired car in Ireland. But having taken my car over for the Royal Tern, then taking the car looked to be a better alternative for a longer break. With my C19 concerns, I'm not comfortable about car sharing yet, so the costs of the trip couldn't be split across a group of friends. But this allowed me to consider a longer break & kipping in the car, rather than having to find B&Bs every night. Having spent a lot of nights kipping in cars on UK & foreign trips, I know that was a practical option to reduce the C19 risks and offsetting the costs of taking the car over. I also knew my Sat Nav worked in Ireland which was another benefit. I looked at various ferry options to travel across, but the cost of the car & my ticket was coming out around £320 - £400. This was before the costs of fuel were added. I put the plans for the trip to one side, as I had a few other commitments in early Mar 22.

My interest was kept warm, as other Birders posted results of their trips on twitter. With the Egyptian Vulture still being around on 10 Mar and no other commitments, I had another looked at travel options & found I could travel from Pembroke Dock on a three day mini break for £238. This was significantly cheaper than the previous quotes. I choose to give myself two full days in Ireland and then come back on the following daytime crossing, when I would be able to have a look for some Cetaceans on the way back. I had already checked there was no problem taking my car over following the problems caused by Brexit. My car insurance covers up to 90 days in Europe, but thanks to Brexit, it wasn't clear if my car insurance could be quickly sorted to travel. It sounds like it took some months post Brexit for the UK & EU to start agreeing new travel arrangements & rules for cars to travel abroad. Ireland has always been the easiest of countries to travel to with a car given they also drive on the correct side of the road. I was pleased to find that rules have settled down now for Ireland & all I needed to do was to confirm that dates & times I would be in Ireland to the insurance company. I booked to travel over on the ferry for that evening. Then I found my passport and panicked. One of the websites I looked at gave the list current documents needed to travel with & it mentioned a passport with six months validity left. My passport only had 25 weeks left. A quick phone call to the ferry company confirmed that a photo driving licence was enough to travel with. I took the passport with my anyway, but nobody asked to see it. Having planned the ferry tickets, I had time to pop out Birding locally for a few hours, as I didn't need to leave for Pembroke until mid-evening. I also had a kip that afternoon, as I knew I wouldn't get a lot of sleep on the ferry. In the end, I managed about 2.5 hours sleep on the ferry crossing. The ferry was relatively under-booked as it looks like they are keeping the number of vehicles low. But thanks to Brexit, a lot of the Irish freight traffic that used to travel into the UK from mainland Europe & then across to Ireland, now bypasses the UK on new direct routes from France to Ireland.

I was woken by an announcement about 06:00 to say we would be docking at Rosslare in about thirty minutes time. Once docked, we were all told to report to the car deck. Not long after I was back in Ireland & starting the 3.5 hour drive to the Egyptian Vulture site. In my rush to book the trip to get to the Egyptian Vulture one day ahead of the weekend Birders, I hadn't checked the weather. It was to be a wet day with the prospect of drying up in the afternoon on the West Coast. I arrived at the gate where Birders had seen the Egyptian Vulture to find nobody was there & it was still raining & windy. After pulling the coat on, I got out to scan the trees. No obvious sign of the Bird. I had assumed it would already have headed off looking for breakfast given it was now about 11:00. Then I looked in the field & found one sogging-looking Vulture, sitting there & not enjoying the weather. After a bit of manoeuvring of the car, I managed to park it, so I could watch the Vulture from the shelter of the car: one bonus of being the only person there.

Egyptian Vulture: A very soggy Vulture photographed in fairly heavy rain

Over the next twenty minutes, I watched it as it sat in the rain & took some photos. I put the news out that it was still on view. Then I looked up in the gap between the gates which gave me a clear view of the Bird: it wasn't there. Jumping out of the car, I saw it was flying over the field. It did one loop of the field, before heading off South East & out of view. Time to consider my options for the afternoon.

Egyptian Vulture: I picked it up in flight heading away from me

Egyptian Vulture: Fortunately, it turned back over the field before heading off South East

The Egyptian Vulture treeline: This photo was taken after it flew from just in front of the treeline

Given it was still raining heavily, I decided against heading for the Northern Harrier site as it would have been just as wet there. Additionally, there had been no news updates over the previous week, but I was hoping Birders would check the site out at the weekend. The added bonus of a longer trip. With the forecast to be brightening up on the West Coast during the afternoon, I decided to head for the Forster's Tern site near Kinvarra near Galway, for the late afternoon. It had stopped raining by the time I arrived, but there was still a strong wind blowing. I tried various viewpoints between Kinvarra & Tracht Beach. It's a great looking area, but unfortunately, I couldn't find the Forster's Tern which seems to feed over several miles of bays & rocky coastline. But it's a great area and in the three hours I was there I saw three Otters catching & eating crabs, several Great Northern Divers, several flocks of Pale-bellied Brent Geese, a male Long-tailed Duck with a long-tail, several Black Guillemots and a Sandwich Tern. One of my early long distance twitches was the original Falmouth Forster's Tern on its first twitchable day, but that was 1980 & it would have been nice to see another one on this side of the pond. Given I was on the West Coast, I decided to drive North that evening to look for the American Black Duck at Cross Lough on The Mullet. The Sat Nat was saying it was only 115 miles, but it took about three hours driving to get there. I found a quiet location close to the Lough to park the car for the night & some well-deserved sleep.

Looking back on the beach at Tracht

2 Feb 22 - Brands Bay's Wintering Rock Pipits

Every now and then over the years, I have seen one or two wintering Rock Pipits at Redhorn Quay, Brands Bay. They are erratic visitors there and they clearly feed elsewhere as well, as I can miss them on visits, before seeing them again. I only see them in the peak of the winter and they appear to leave well before the Spring: albeit I generally only walk out there in the Autumn and Winter. I've always assumed they are the local Rock Pipits from Old Harry or the Purbeck coastline. Finally, I managed to get some decent photos of one individual.

Rock Pipit

Local Lytchett Bay ringer, Shaun Robson, has commented that "our work so far has failed to identify any difference between the Rock Pipit races in non-breeding plumage: I am anticipating that we may find that Scandinavian are whiter in outer tail feathers, but that's not confirmed". They believe all of their wintering Rock Pipits are the Scandinavian subspecies at Lytchett Bay, which is at the other end of Poole Harbour. There is an ongoing colour-ringing scheme to see if any of their Rock Pipits can be located in the breeding season to confirm this. So, could this be a local Rock Pipit or a wintering Scandinavian individual?

Rock Pipit

Rock Pipit

Rock Pipit

Rock Pipit

Rock Pipit