A Black-winged Pratincole returns to Mission near Doncaster

  

The Black-winged Pratincole is yet another bird that I have history with having dipped the one at Frampton Marsh RSPB a number of years back. When one was found on a gravel pit complex near Doncaster my good birding friend Nick Truby messaged me to ask if I was going. This was an occasion when birding was definitely taken a back seat to family affairs, in this case the wedding of my gorgeous youngest daughter Josie. On Friday I was recovering from a truly memorable day and thinking about where to go birding on Saturday when some rather surprising information appeared on our “twitching the UK” WhatsApp group and RBA. After being absent for 5 days the Pratincole had returned to the original spot.

 

After a quick chat with my ever suffering lovely wife Carolyn  I set off towards Doncaster. The news had hit social media around 10:30 and I departed at 11:30 on what turned out to be an awful drive north. The M5, M42 and M1 are blighted by yet more roadworks, the majority of it being down to the total incompetence of road planners. By changing the hard shoulder to the fourth lane on motorways they have basically turned them into a death trap for anyone unfortunate enough to break down. I’ve read that the average time between breaking down and being hit is 5 minutes! I understand that the first smart motorway was supposed to be complete and the results analysed before more were converted but the powers to be decided it would be a good idea not to  wait for the data and convert lots of motorways anyway! Having realised that they had manufactured death traps they are now busy installing more emergency break down areas which is fine if you are “lucky” enough to break down next to one. The net result for the ever suffering driver is that within a year or two of all the chaos caused by “upgrading” to smart motorways we now have the travel chaos again as they install more emergency areas!

 

So, after being parked on the M1 for an hour I eventually arrived at the designated parking area just before 15:00. It was a 30 minute walk along a track to the reported viewing spot. On the way I met Oxon birder Adrian Sparrowhawk who told me that the Pratincole had been showing and hawking for insects over the water. The first group of birders watching the bird helped me get onto the Pratincole flying over the lake and there was UK bird number 415. Now I could relax and enjoy myself watching the bird!

 

With just 44 records to the end of 2022 this Pratincole is rated as a rare vagrant to the UK. In the breeding season it is normally  found in the warmer parts of south-east Europe  and south-west Asia before migrating to tropical Africa for the winter. Somewhat strangely, while they are classified as waders they share almost no behavioural characteristics with them. Rather they typical hunt their insect prey on the wing like Swifts and Swallows. It has short legs, long pointed wings, and a forked tail. Unlike other waders, it has a short bill, an adaptation to aerial feeding. The back and head are brown, and the wings are brown with black flight feathers. The belly is white and the underwings are black. Good views are needed to distinguish it from the two other Pratincoles that have been recorded in the UK, the scarce Collared Pratincole, which I have been fortunate to see a number of times, and the very rare Oriental Pratincole with just 7 UK records which I have never seen.

 

In the 3 hours that I was on site the Pratincole split its time between feeding on the wing and preening in the long grass occasionally on view. It’s hard to imagine why this agile jet powered swift impersonator is classified as a wader. I assume it’s due to evolutionary proximity, i.e DNA. It was hawking for insects over the lake exactly like the many hirundines present. It would even do the up and mid-air stall manoeuvrer to catch insects just like Swallows and Swifts. At a distance it was only distinguishable by its size.

  

 

Photography was hard work with distance, the speed of the bird in flight and heat haze combining to allow at best record shots so I spent most of the time watching the bird through my bins when it was in the air and with my scope when it was on the ground.

 

I made the long slow journey home in considerably better spirts than on the way up passing time listening to the euros quarter finals, nice and relaxing compared, I’m sure, to the upper coming England  match.

 

Footnote – my blogs are posted with sometimes rather imaginative spelling and grammar due to my extreme dyslexia!