Prawle Point (1 Viewer)

Sunday 16/02/03. A day out to find the Cirl Bunting.

Ros & I left her friends about 22:30 and drove southwards towards the Prawle point area of Devon. For those that don’t know this site it is south of Torcross, which is a village on the edge of Slapton Ley. Slapton Ley is south of Dartmouth. When you come out of Torcross you have to turn left and follow the East Prawle sign. Once you have gone through East Prawle you go through some very narrow lanes until you come to the car park. Prawle point can be reached from the Kingsbridge end as well. Take the A379 going east towards Torcross and when you reach Frogmore take a left and follow the East Prawle signs again. Don’t miss out checking out various obvious sites along this road, especially Frogmore as there you can get relatively close to Little Egrets and other waders.

My intended place of sleeping was near to Slapton Ley and we duly parked up in the Anglers car park at 11:15. Once we had wrapped ourselves up with the duvet it wasn’t too long before we were sound asleep, well that was until Max decided to give our ears wet kisses.

We awoke to the alarm at 06:45 to a wild, windy, very cold and grey day. Totally opposite to the day before. We had our breakfast and a cuppa before driving around to the Torcross end of Slapton Ley. First thing I noticed was that the hide had disappeared that I normally use. Next thing I noticed, as I got out of the car, was the bitingly cold wind and the huge waves out to sea. Slapton Ley (which is a large body of water the other side of the road from the sea) was almost devoid of birds but there was a lone Cormorant and Great crested Grebe as well as quite a few Tufted Duck and Mallard. Black headed and Herring Gulls were present in numbers but apart from the odd Coot and Moorhen nothing else could be seen. It was a waste of time looking across the sea, as the wind was far too fierce and the cold cut right through you. We decided not too hang around here but to go straight to Prawle Point

It was 09:00 when we reached here. To reach the Cirl Bunting site you cross the stone sty and follow the path going left. Right takes you to the seawatching area. We were soon in the Cirl Bunting area but realised that we had made one mistake. No gloves!! Boy was it cold and your hands felt like they were dropping off. Mine were going so numb I could hardly feel them. Unfortunately this probably meant that the Cirl’s weren’t going to show in this bitterly cold easterly wind and that is how it turned out to be. We actually came back to Prawle Point later in the day but still nothing showed, not even the plentiful Yellowhammer that are normally seen everywhere around here.

Birds we were treated to were a quick fly over of a Peregrine. A few Common Buzzard, one that came extremely close, but unfortunately my hands were too cold to hold the camera properly so a good photo went begging. The resident pair of Kestrels showed plus the many Robins and Dunnocks that are dotted all around this site. One lone Stonechat showed just below the car park and a few Oystercatchers could be seen far down on the rocks. One nice sight was a very flighty flock of about 300+ finches. They hardly ever dropped down but when they did they almost immediately took off again. I did manage a five second look at them, whilst they landed on a couple of small trees, and most of them were Linnets with a few Chaffinch amongst them. In the car park were plenty of Chaffinch, Blackbird, Robins, Dunnock, Great Tit and Blue Tit and this is one area that can spring up anything on migration. I have had a few Firecrests around here before now.

I have placed a couple of photos in the gallery to show you what the place looks like.

We had spent a couple of hours at Prawle Point and it was time to move on, as I wanted to see if I could get a Little Egret. Frogmore is an excellent place to go and it didn’t disappoint me. It was a shame that the weather was so cold and grey. The light was extremely bad whilst we were there. Straight away a Kingfisher was seen by the bridge, then a lone Little Egret could be seen about a 100 yards away. A couple of photos of this bird are in the gallery. As I watched the Egret the sight of a Redshank that was limping badly came into view. I felt so sorry for this bird as it was clearly struggling to get around. Apart from that it looked healthy enough but each time it bent down to pick something out of the mud it seemed to lose its balance. I have placed a photo of this bird in the gallery too but as the day was so grey and the bird was about 100 yards away the photo isn’t too brilliant.

Whilst watching these birds a surprise visitor flew in when a Greenshank alighted right next to the Redshank. I didn’t get too much of a chance to fire off many shots of this distant bird as it flew off again 5 minutes later but I did manage to get one half decent shot and I have put that in the gallery as well. I had spent an hour here and as we were going to call into some of our friends in Chudleigh Knighton it was decided to go back to Prawle point again but as I said earlier it was no better than our earlier foray into the area.

At the end of the two days I did manage to add 12 birds to my year list. They were:

1. Tawny Owl
2. Glossy Ibis
3. Spoonbill
4. Avocet
5. Black tailed Godwit
6. Bar tailed Godwit
7. Common Gull
8. Common Sandpiper
9. Shag (seen at the Turf (Andrew missed it-only Kingfisher & me saw it)
10. Little Egret
11. Greenshank

A thoroughly enjoyable two days out especially the day with the intrepid 4. As Kingfisher said. We all seemed to get on extremely well and all seemed to have had a good day.

Apart from the Glossy Ibis I have to say that the highlight for me were the displaying Kestrels. I think that they impressed all 4 of us as we stayed for quite a while whilst they performed in front of us.

Hi John J.

Thanks for the report.

Don't get down to the South Coast very often, but I'll bear Prawle Point in mind, next time.

Question...

I've seen mention of Glossy Ibises in a few threads on the Forum, but I've obviously not been paying that much attention.

Anyway, last time I looked, the Glossy wasn't in my Mitchell Beazley. Is it a regular visitor to Prawle (or UK)? Has it been here a while?

I have to say, I sort of assumed that if it ever occured here in blighty, it would be in summer.

Birdman.

First of all the Glossy Ibis is at Bowling Green Marsh at Topsham, near to Exeter and these birds rarely come to Britain. there was a tiny influx of these birds a few months ago of about 15-20 birds. They all dispersed then disappeared except this one that appears to have become a long stayer.

Thanks John J.

I noticed from your pic in the Gallery, that the Ibis was at Topsham.

I hope you don't mind if I take my ignorance a stage further!

Do you know if the Ibis is a loner, or whether it has hung on to anything that is making it's home at Topsham?

For whatever reason the influx occured, it seems unusual that all the rest have left, but this one stayed behind.

Clearly, Topsham presents an environment where Glossy Ibises can survive (assuming, I guess, that we don't have any extreme winters).

Do you suppose it will stay "forever", and become Topsham's version of "Sammy the Stilt" ("Izzy the Ibis"?!?!?)?

Birdman

<Do you suppose it will stay "forever", and become Topsham's version of "Sammy the Stilt" ("Izzy the Ibis"?!?!?)?>

Who knows!! only time will tell but that is a good name you have given it just in case it does.

When I saw it it was with a few Moorhens. Come to think about it we saw it again near to dusk at another part of the reserve and it was with Moorhens then.

John, Glad you had a great day despite the cold, at prawle which is one of my top faves. I was sad to see you did not get cirls or Yellowhammers. Yesterday I had a Bonaparte's Gull at Shobrooke and will go back tomorrow to see it again if I can! I saw Shag today from the cruise up the Exe. Will post a report soon. Loved your report cos I can visualise it left and right. If it was August or September I know you would have gone both ways!

Andrew
<If it was August or September I know you would have gone both ways!>

Dead right too: LOL

Hey John J,

Well you were quite right about the weather the following day, what a difference, i enjoyed your report about Slapton and Prawle, many happy memories of Slapton, did not know the hide had gone though.....a real puzzle there, maybe some member on here could shed some light on this !!!!, my girlfriend and me are staying in the Slapton area at the end of May for a friends wedding so we are going to make a week of it, just hope the weather perks up then !!!!!!!!!!

Really pleased you you enjoyed you day on Saturday, hope we all do it again sometime....

John

If I may go careering off topic for a moment:

When you mention Slapton on the south coast, is that anywhere near the area I've heard referred to as Slapton Sands?

I know little about it, but know there was some sort of awful incident there in WWII -- where perhaps a 'practice' invasion was run (prior to Normandy in '44). And there was an awful loss of life, as I recall.

Just curious.....

The very same, Beverley.

There is a tank (recovered from the sea) as a memorial there with stories on plaques about the incident.

I have some photos of the long beach area from last summer when we were on holiday there - I will post them in the Gallery sometime.

Best part of the holiday was the Cetti's Warblers on the bridge near the entrance to Slapton Ley. Never failed to hear them calling, and see them flitting around, every time we walked down from the campsite.

Andrew

Where the hide used to be it is now cordoned off with tape. I haven't a clue what has happened to it. Hopefully it has been knocked down to make way for a new one but the old one seemed good enough to me. I looked for burns around the ground (in case it had been burnt down) but couldn't see any, unles it has been burned down and cleared away some time ago.

I checked my dates and would you believe that it was a year to the exact dates that I last visited both Bowling Green and Slapton Ley / Prawle point. Yes we will have to do it again but the lack of a job is stopping me from doing a lot of things at the moment.

Which hide is this, the car park hide on the sea side or the other hide on the other side? Are there still two hides there and are you saying there used to be three hides?

Thanks for the information, Diane. I remember hearing (on TV) that this incident was hushed up quite a bit, because it was such a screw-up, American-caused, I believe I remember seeing an 'expose' about it on "60 Minutes" or some such, years and years ago.

Andrew

The sea side hide in the car park by the tank. That is the one that has gone missing.

Beverley,
The tragedy at Slapton was known as Exercise Tiger, and was a full scale mock up for D Day. As I understand it there were a number of incidents. The Exercise was left without Naval cover due to bad weather preventing the escorts leaving Plymouth. A marauding E-Boat caused some casualties when it raided the group. Far more serious was the fact that many men drowned due to the landing ships being anchored so far from the beach. Any of the locals could have pointed out that the beach doesn't slope, but drops away sharply. The authorities didn't realise this and what should have been a wade ashore turned into a disaster as men loaded down with equipment struggled to survive. To compound what had become a farce, live ammunition was used to add a sense of realism, and some troops were killed by "friendly fire" - no wonder it was hushed up until the 1980's

Darrell

Hi John sorry to see you didn't get your Cirl Bunting. Have you allready seen one? I've only ever seen one here in France,on top of a telephone pole singing his heart out. A very striking looking bird indeed, extraordinarily handsome. Mind you the female looks very much like Yellowhammer, I've maybe seen it loads of times and mis-identified it!!
PS The history off Slapton Sands is a new one on me, unfortunately Military and Intelligence don't allways go together.

Paul

I have seen literally hundreds of the Cirl's abroad and evey time I have visited Prawle I have seen them, except this weekend. I have actually found a nest full of chicks at Prawle Point quite by chance. I was lying on the ground in August, last year, and the male dropped into the bush buy the side of me. The chicks suddenly errupted into their begging calls. All the time I had lain there I hadn't heard a peep from them.

The Slapton Leys history is well known and yes you are right regading military and intelligence not gelling. I doubt if that will ever change.

It is a great place to go birdwatching but can be very cold as John J has pointed out in his thread, also if you walk the beach after a storm you will find folk out with their metal detectors picking up used and some still live ammunition from that very sad episode in Slaptons history as there is still what seems to be a never ending stream of ammonition still out there, i have found some there on my travels.

That was a good vantage point but I for one will not be sorry to see the hide go if it is to make way for a new better one. I am angry if someone torched it for a sick joke!

John

I'm glad you had a good day despite the cold and not getting all the birds you wanted. I've never had much luck at Slapton Ley either, but I'd love to try Prawle Point one day. Sorry I couldn't make the trip with you and Ros.

Still, it was a good read of your activities in an area I know well- thanks a lot.