The Standlake Birder

  If its avian bling that you are after you would be hard pressed to beat a Hoopoe, a scarce passage migrant to the UK.   In preparation for its passage to Africa, a very showy individual of said bird has been fattening itself up on grubs for the past few days on a Warwick  industrial estate just 40 minutes from home. I’ve seen a number of Hoopoes, both in the UK and in their winter home of Africa, but have never got a decent photo. I hence found myself sitting on the grass by the reception of IBM late morning today with a handful of other birders and photographers watching this exotic visitor.   Hoopoes are fairly common and widespread across Europe, Asia, and Africa but only occur as a scare spring and autumn passage vagrant to the UK. In a good year perhaps 50 birds  are seen in the UK. There are three recognised species, the Eurasian Hoopoe which spends the warmer months in Europe before migrating to Africa for the winter and the resident African a...

Red-backed Shrike On Thursday morning, after the traditional hearty breakfast, we set off towards Loch Spiggie where a putative Eastern Yellow Wagtail had been found at the adjacent Noss farm. The Eastern Yellow Wagtail, as the name suggests, breeds in eastern Siberia and Alaska and winters in Asia and Australia. The phylogeny of the Yellow Wagtail group is complex and, quite honestly, extremely confusing, literally dozens of sub species have been described at one time or another. In the past Western and Eastern Yellow Wagtails have been lumped together as one species but they have been recently split into two distinctive species. I would, however, not be at all surprised though if they are reunited at some future point! The Eastern Yellow Wagtail has a slender and long-tailed appearance and, in general, a bright yellow breast, paler throat and a greyish-olive back. The tail is black with white outer feathers and it often pumps it    up and down while walking on the ground. Th...

Two-barred Greenish Warbler Oh Yorkshire what are you on!   Whatever it is I want some!   By my reckoning Yorkshire has now had had five absolute belting mega rare birds this autumn. So Norfolk I’m afraid the scores on the doors are   Yorkshire 5 – Norfolk 0   Looks as though Norfolk will be battling out the relegation positions with Oxfordshire and Worcestershire!   On Saturday early afternoon news came in that a scarce Red-breasted Flycatcher found earlier at Flamborough was in fact a mega rare Taiga Flycatcher, (3 accepted previous UK records on the BBRC database).   This was hotly followed at 5pm by the news that a Two-barred Greenish Warbler had been found at Spurn, (8 accepted previous UK records on the BBRC database).   This double delight was even more surprising given the prevailing winds were not particularly favourable for pushing migrating birds a long way off course and onto our shores.   Other immoveable commitments on Sunday meant t...

  Olive-backed Pipit I’m told that if you go to Shetland for a week’s birding in Autumn you can expect at least one weather wipe out day – ours was Monday! The clue to the average strength of the wind is the lack of natural trees. I would guess the wind speed during our week averaged around 20-30mph peaking at 60-70 mph.  The lack of natural cover basically means there is no where to hide from the weather and when it rains in these winds the rain comes down horizontal and sandblasts your face – probably good for the complexion but not for birdwatching. Monday then was essentially a complete wipe out with 60 -70 mph winds most of the day and torrential stinging rain. We did manage to see two Red Grouse from the minibus but that was pretty much it.   On Tuesday morning we packed the car and headed generally south towards our base for the remaining 4 days of the holiday, Sumburg hotel on the south coast of the mainland adjacent to the airport. With no serious rarities t...