Aston End

Haven't done the 5 mile circuit for some time. and I wasn't sure how it would go, but I took it slow easy and managed to do it this morning. It was a lovely winters day, rather cold, very sunny but there were problems with icy stretches of roads, and some of the fields were rather muddy in places.
Birds were very patchily distributed with long stretches that were very quiet. Just about the most visible and vocal birds were Blue and Great Tits which seemed to be present and very active everywhere.
The little copse near Redwings farm is always pretty good and I spent a while here hoping for a Nuthatch, but without success, but fortunately one was singing further down the lane towards Aston End and I got reasonable views of another later on in the bluebell bank at the end of Holders Lane.
There were a small number of Skylarks in the fields but there was a distinct lack of finches and buntings.
Numbers of thrushes were as expected rather low-it doesn't seem to be a good year for them. Lots of Blackbirds of course, and a couple of singing Song Thrushes but I only managed to locate three Redwing and a total of 18 Fieldfare.
The conditions should have suited raptors, and I managed to see five Buzzards, two Kites and a Kestrel.

I didn't get any decent wildlife photos, but took the short lens along in the hope of getting a few scenic shots. In the end I concentrated on some frosty logs. Ones been reworked into a B&W image as I felt it worked well.

Hawfinch at Bramfield

While waiting to take Mum out shopping this morning, I was watching the garden for a few minutes, and noticed two birds fly in that looked a bit different to the regular visitors. I was surprised to see a female Blackcap only a few yards away, and a male further back. I've always assumed that they are regular winter visitors, but with only a few hours coverage a month at this time, it's hardly surprising I rarely get to see any.

After the shopping trip, I drove down to Bramfield church, just as Colin was leaving. After a bit of a gap, some Hawfinches have returned for winter, and one at least has been showing over the morning.

I had to wait a while before it showed, in the big bare tree in the garden north of the church.

I kept an eye on the surrounding fields while I was there, but apart from a couple of Kites the only birds of note were a small flock of Fieldfares.

Some of the regulars were present, but I was surprised when Graham White appeared. I had to ask what he was doing here, as he gets Hawfinches around his garden most winters, but apparently the views this year haven't been all that good!

After around an hour, I left and had a drive around the area hoping to find a Golden Plover flock, or some more thrushes but it turned out to be very quiet in the countryside.

Not Quite Summer at Abberton

On the 4th Colin paid a visit to Abberton reservoir and had a pretty good selection of birds, including a couple of rarities. There wasn't a great deal on the coast and as we wanted a fairly short trip, it was a toss up between Rutland Water or go to Abberton since there were a few things he missed.
I drove over in squally rain but by the time I got to his place it had dried up, but remained very windy all day.
We stopped off at Layer Bretton causeway first to scan the western end. There were plenty of duck on view with vast flocks of Tufted Duck and Teal to sift through in the hope that the Ring Necked Duck or Green Winged Teal were still around-they hadn't been seen for a couple of days, and of course we failed. A couple of red head Smew were good to see as they have been very hard to come by this winter, and we also saw the first of four or five Great White Egrets. The grey geese were mobile and hard to see here and we missed the Russian Whitefronts.
The Layer de la Hay causeway was a new experience for me as its been many years since my last visit so the new raised wall was something different. It was very exposed though. I found the first of three Long Tailed Ducks here but it was a bit distant for photography. Apparently it had been near the sluice viewpoint earlier.

At the viewpoint there were several confiding Goosander. Apparently the sluice attracts shoals of Perch which pulls in the fish eating duck.

I missed the star bird while looking at the Long Tail but it reappeared despite the horrendous wind. The juvenile Swallow was certainly something rather unexpected in January, but because of the mild conditions it has stuck around for a while now. There is also a House Martin wintering on the south coast, so there are certainly plenty of insects for them, at least until the cold wintery weather eventually arrives (that's assuming it does).
We spent a long time looking for the Black Throated Diver from several locations and eventually ended up north of the visitors centre to check the northern section. This was a well wooded area in the old days before the water levels were increased, with some nice little bits for water birds and a fantastic feeding station. Its a bit bare and open now, and the new trees and shrubs have yet to really get going.
We failed to find the diver here, but I was pleased to find two Slavonian Grebes having missed one off Titchwell. A couple more Great White Egrets were on view-it wasn't long ago that they were a big rarity, now they are expected anywhere in the south. I had hoped that the Hen Harrier would put in an appearance, but apart from one Red Kite and a Kestrel battling the headwinds no raptors were seen. No doubt the conditions were To blame.

Amwell and the Caspian Gull Again (Updated late evening)

Popped down to Amwell this morning for a couple of hours. The weather wasn't all that great, dull drizzly and windy. On the other hand it was fairly warm for this time of the year.
I was on my own much of the time though I bumped into Phil. couple of times.
There were a fair number of gulls on the water when I arrived though the seven Greater Black Backs was the only species of note. There were a few Grey Herons around including one appearing to be on territory on the island. Ducks seem to be down with only Gadwall and Mallard being noticeable. I think many were either at the back of the big island and out of view or up on Tumbling Bay. There were no Teal, Shoveler or Wigeon for example. I was lucky enough to catch a pair of Goosander flying over Hollycross and up the As Valley.
I walked through the woods picking up a pair of Great Spotted Woodpeckers, a couple of Redwing and a small number of Siskins in the Alders. I then carried on up to Tumbling Bay, where some of the missing Pochard and Shovelers were found. The usual Grey Wagtail was around the lock and I also heard a Chiffchaff here.
The walk back to Hollycross proved to be rather quiet apart from a few Goldcrests and a calling Bullfinch so I returned and stopped off at the Bittern Pool for a while to scan the Alders and the distant woods-Phil had mentioned that the Ravens were being seen regularly but all I had were somewhat acrobatic Jackdaws.
Back at the view point the skittish Lapwing suggested that a Peregrine was around somewhere but they seemed to go up whenever a gull flew over and the only raptor present was a distant Buzzard.

With a bit of time in hand I called in at Fairlands. Parking in the main car park, I just had to stroll down the slope to spot the Caspian Gull, which was a bit more photogenic than last time.

This is the Caspian

And these are of a rather white headed Herring type that I initially took photos of and assumed was the Caspian. I didn't spot that it wasn't ringed!

Lunar Eclipse.

I wasn't really prepared for this tonight, since its generally been cloudy and or raining. So I basically stuck my head out of the window, saw the full Moon was well up in the clear east sky band grabbed the Panasonic GX8 and shot handheld with the zoom set to 400mm.
Normally if I had thought it through this afternoon I would have had the 115mm f7 apo refractor set up and ready though that generally guarantees poor weather. I would have certainly obtained a much better image scale and resolution.

One very nice benefit of the mirrorless cameras is that the live viewfinder view gives a very good impression of the actual exposure. I needed to dial in 3 stops of underexposure to avoid the highlights blowing out.
Very similar to the eclipse that I photographed from exactly the same spot 39 years and one day ago, though that was on  slide film and I used a 200mm zoom lens on my Pentax MX. The results weren't exactly brilliant but the slides are still knocking around in a cupboard somewhere.

A New Year and Two Lifers.

Colin and I decided to do the usual New Year thing and visit the Titchwell area of Norfolk. I was a bit unsure about how things would pan out, but I managed to get through the day without too many problems.
The day started out as per usual with a singing Robin as I got up closely followed by a croak from the local Carrion Crow. A Blue Tit arrived on the fat feeder and then Colin arrived. It was a bit of a drag adding a handful of species as we drove up the A10 and by the time we got to our first destination I had accumulated a year list of around 15.
The farm between Sedgeford and Ringstead has a nice big dung heap-a great place to kick off the year!. The attraction was the male Eastern Yellow Wagtail which has been around for  a week or so. Luckily most had already been up to see it so it wasn't too busy, but there was a steady turn over of visitors while we were there.
Although the Yellow Wagtail complex is a bit of a minefield with various subspecies and head patterns throughout Europe Asia and Africa, it has recently been split into two species with the divide somewhere east of the Urals, and the eastern species have a much harsher call than (most) of the western ones. All the previous records 0f which there have only been a few accepted have been the grey female/juvenile plumage whereas this is a first winter male and is a bit of a stunner.
We first saw it on the side of the dung heap but then flew down to the puddles in front of us and was heard a couple of times.

It was very cold there and after about half an hour of very close views-amazing in the scope we decided to carry on to Titchwell, missing our usual call in to the Thornham Harbour Twite.
Unfortunately with a lot of water there weren't many birds apart from wildfowl on the fresh marsh, but things improved somewhat as we reached the tidal areas and the beach. For once pretty much all the available waders were found-no need to wait until autumn for Spotted Redshank this year. The sea was a bit quiet and it was pot luck as to what various people were seeing and I missed several divers grebes and sea duck that others had reported. Visibility was a bit poor though the clam sea was some compensation as most birds were distant.

After lunch we headed home via Chosely. The huge flock of Pink footed Geese-several thousand strong held a few Tundra Bean Geese which proved a bit hard to find though the Barnacle Goose stood out rather better. Some Russian White Fronts were also in the flock but they were very hard, tucked well down in a corner dip behind a hedge but did show occasionally. No idea if there recent Lesser White Front is still around.
The next stop was at Fring where many more thousands of Pink Feet held more Tundra Beans, Barnacles and more importantly a Grey Belled Brant from Melville Island in arctic Canada. This enigmatic form of Brent/Brant has been reported on a few occasions in Ireland and elsewhere in the UK but this was the first that we were able to get to. Looked very good, and despite the distance really stood out in the binoculars.
A quick pit stop and shop at Welney provided a stunning hunting Barn Owl and a flock of Tree Saprrows before the light went completely.