The Standlake Birder

Yesterday I spent 5 hours starting at a puddle, as you do,  in the Forest of Dean hoping to photograph Crossbills. The Crossbills, however, had other ideas so here are a few consolation pictures of the Nuthatches and Crossbills.    

Bewick's Swan   Late autumn is, in my humble opinion, the very best time to visit Slimbridge. At this time of year wetlands are absolutely teeming with migrant wildfowl returning from their artic breeding grounds. Amongst the common wildfowl, Teal, Widgeon, Pintail etc., you should find Bewick's Swan and White-fronted Goose, nationally scarer birds but Slimbridge regulars.   Thursday dawned very dull but I decided to go to Slimbridge anyway and was rewarded with a couple of hours of lovely wintery light, much paler and less harsh that the strong summer sun and much better for photography.   The Rushy hide is my favourite hide for photography at Slimbridge. At this time of year the sun is behind the hide which is low down providing a more natural angle for photographing the birds. It is also a great place to view and photograph one of my favourite UK ducks, the Pintail. At other sites they tend to be fairly skittish and distant but at Slimbridge they are very confiding often bei

  Tuesday was a birding day of great extremes, a Pied Wheatear that was so confiding  that I could have picked it up and put it in my pocket and a Scoter flock so distant that I could hardly make individuals out.   This is how my strange brain works. Even though I had the best October ever with  an astonishing five life ticks in Shetland followed by another in Suffolk, I start to get twitchy feet if much more than a week goes by without any decent birding. This state of affairs leads me to consider dafter and dafter trips. When a showy Pied Wheatear was found on the coast just north of Newcastle a week or so ago I resolved not to go as I did not need it for my UK list and it was a punishing four hour drive. However, after eleven days with no birding to speak of and cracking photos posted on social media my twitchy feet had me in the car at 05:30 heading north! My plan was to see the Wheatear first and then either drive a further 60 miles up the coast to try and see a Black Scoter, whic