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| Brown Shrike |
I had planned a days birding last Friday and, with an easterly wind blowing in from the continent, it seemed as though the east coast was the right place to be. A few reports of comparatively scarce migrants such as Red-breasted Flycatcher and Yellow-browed Warbler were coming in suggesting that birds were definitely on the move. The easterly wind also held the promise of something much rarer being blown in from the continent.
I was faced with a choice between the Yorkshire or Norfolk coasts and did not make up my mind until I was sitting in my car ready to depart at 05:30. It was pretty much a toss of the coin situation but in the end I opted for Yorkshire, a few more miles but a much easier, mainly motorway, drive.
Well you can probably guess what happened but read on!
The “Yorkshire is the new PIT 60” refers to how many times I have already been to Yorkshire this year as opposed to previous years where I was almost resident at pit 60. Unlike the vast majority of hides in the UK, the hides at pit 60 remain closed and, given that the Covid second wave is now upon us, look unlikely to open in the foreseeable future. Mick has been up a couple of times doing his monthly survey and sadly reports that the site is essentially dead as a wetland reserve, the inevitable result of several years of neglect and mismanagement – see my blog from last year.
My cunning plan was to go to Bempton RSPB first to see if I could connect with a reported Red-breasted Flycatcher and then to go for a walk along the cliffs to watch the Gannets. I was then intending to drop down to either Spurn of Flamborough head depending on what was reported.
With one coffee break on an otherwise uneventful journey, I arrived at Bempton around 09:30. Checking RBA I found that a Brown Shrike, a bird that was high on my UK wish list, had been found at Wells on the Norfolk coast .. B*gger!! I consoled myself with the fact that I would have a nice days birding in Yorkshire and that there would be other future opportunities for the Shrike.
I searched the small scrubby area known as the Dell where the flycatcher had been seen the previous evening without success and then headed over to the staff at the RSPB desk for further advice. They said that the bird was being rather elusive but had been seen briefly in a small wooded area on the opposite side of the road to the Dell. As I walked over to this area I heard the Flycatcher almost continuously singing. I thought this was very strange behaviour for an autumn bird but the penny soon dropped! There were bird nets in the centre of the wood and a tape of the bird was being played to lure the bird in. Now, as per previous blogs, I’m not a great fan of capturing birds in nets and ringing. In this case it seemed very hard to justify as the bird had already been caught and ringed the previous day. I soon decided that this one was not for me and headed over to the cliffs.
There were still plenty of Gannets and Fulmars, the latter being a year tick, on and around the cliffs and I spent a very pleasant hour watching and photographing these acrobatic birds as they glided effortlessly on thermals driven by the bright autumnal sun. The cliffs also held a small number of gawky looking juvenile Gannets.
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| Gannets |
And then the inevitable happened….
It’s like a scratch that you can quite reach to itch …
It’s an addiction I know ….
My little demon had appeared on my shoulder and was whispering in my ear…..
You’ve always wanted to see a Brown Shrike haven’t you …..?
Wasn’t it one of the birds you were hoping to see this autumn ….
There might not be another one …..
I bet its showing really well …..
You are going to be dead p*ssed off aren’t you when you see stunning pictures of it on line later …..
Afterall It’s only a 4 hour drive ….
So 4 hours later and after yet another encounter with the black hole which traps cars at the centre of Lincoln, I parked in Wells and walked along the path adjacent to the salt marsh to the hedge where the Shrike was being reported. The bird was not visible from the footpath but the local farmer had very kindly granted access to a field from which it could be viewed. The great thing about Shrikes, as I’ve said many times before, is that if they are there they are very obvious due to their habit of perching in full view while scanning the landscape for insects.
The Brown Shrike is an interesting worked example of how the birding landscape is changing. My Collins bird guide bible, published in 2010, rates it as a three star mega rareity, i.e one or two records a decade but in recent years it has become more common with a small number of records most years mainly relating to first winter birds. Indeed there have been 25 accepted UK records up to the end of 2018. They breed in northern Asia from Mongolia to Siberia and winter in South Asia, Myanmar and the Malay Peninsula.
On arrival at the site the bird was immediately obvious perched in the hedge, occasionally dropping down to grab an insect. On one occasion it appeared to catch a wasp and spent some time manipulating it in its beak, I would guess to remove the sting. As the name suggests the bird had a chestnut brown cap, tail and back with the tell-tale bandit stripe behind its eye. To my eye the colour combination and its rather cheeky perching habit made it a very appealing bird and I watched it for some 90 minutes until the light started to fade and I commenced my long drive home content with my life tick.
Brown Shrike
On Saturday news of a Short-toed Lark “only” some 70 miles away in Surrey hit RBA. I had been messaging my good birding buddy Nick in the morning with location details of the Shrike as he was planning to go that afternoon and later that day he messaged me to ask if I was going to see the Lark. Nick went on Sunday morning, got good views and reciprocated with very clear location and parking details for the Lark. Family commitments meant that it would have to be a fair quick Sunday afternoon visit and so I arrived at the ploughed field the Lark had been frequenting around 13:00. There were ten or so other birders present and I was told that the bird had left the ploughed area an hour previously and had flown to an adjacent field where hay was being turned, presumably to feed on the disturbed insects. After 30 minutes or so most birders moved to the far end of the hay field where a flock of Sky Larks had flown in. I decided to stay by the ploughed field as I always think that, unless the bird is actually reported elsewhere, you are better off staying in one place where the bird has known to have been rather than chase around. I also felt that it was going to be very hard to get a clear view of the Lark in the field with vegetation. Sure enough after a short while a very pale bird that was a strong candidate for the Lark appeared in the ploughed field some 50 meters in front of me. I did not see it fly in so perhaps it had walked from the back of the field. I manged to get some good scope views and to rattle off a few record pictures before it again flew off. I sent a back of the camera image to Nick who confirmed it was indeed the Short-toed Lark, my second uk life tick of the weekend. I reported the sighting to RBA and the other birders returned and a few looked rather forlornly at my photo. I am somewhat ashamed to say that I felt rather smug with my decision to stay put!
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| Short-toed Lark |
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