Backwater Birding - Seaton, Devon (2 Viewers)

[Gavin Haig]

Overcame massive inertia this morning to do a ridiculously early seawatch. Discovered that the scope still works, and saw some birds through it - mostly at considerable range. An hour produced: Gannet 69/34 (W/E), Manxie 5/2, Sandwich Tern 2, Kittiwake 1, Razorbill 1, and Whimbrel 2. That was quite enough excitement for one day.

This afternoon the new garden pond received a couple of new visitors - a blue chaser type thing, which didn't pose and didn't stay, and this Blue-tailed Damsel, which did both. I foresee much distraction when there is a bit of emergent vegetation for things to perch on.....

 

[Simon Wakely]

Good Evening everyone.
Spent this evening in the garden in the miserable rain, rounding off a good Father's Day. Tonight I saw;
• A juvenile Great-Spotted Woodpecker, as shown by a quick snap in the attached photo. Apologies for the poor picture quality, believe me, the weather was worse.
• The usual Jays were in the garden again.

Didn't do much else birdwise, as our son Paul turned up from Plymouth for a surprise Father's Day visit on one of his rare days off.

Hopefully have a better day tomorrow, weather permitting.

Happy Birding,
Simon & Sue Wakely.

 

[Steve Waite]

Ringing this morning at Colyford, madness!!!! Got to the ringing hut for about 07:30, and walked out to the main reedbed with fellow ringer/birder Peter Robinson (Honiton-based). A Green Sand flew up from the wet patch, which was nice, our first autumn bird, but then my eyes became diverted by a low flying large raptor flying slowly south over the reserve, this is what my brain said...
"That's early in the day for a Buzzard, especially in this utter crap weather, I should take a look at it through my bins, oh but my hands are full with mist-net poles, and it will only be a Common Buzzard because that is what it always is...." So, on we went! We jumped the brook and climbed the bank on the south side of the reserve en-route to or target reedbed, but there it was again, still low, being mobbed by a couple of Herring Gulls. My brain then went..."Oh well, I better take a look at it, release poles from hands, put bins to eyes, point towards bird......OH HECK! That's no Buzzard...(brief pause to take in a bit of detail)....HONEY BUZZARD!" Peter quickly downed his tools, and was soon looking at the bird, agreeing with my identification and pointing out a few other features I hadn't noticed. What a bird, I still can't believe the tail on it!! It's diddy sticky-out head was pale grey, which me think makes it a male. All the views I've ever had of H.B's are of distant blobs with long wings, so it's nice to see one up close, striking or what!!??
Anyway I rang Frazer, as I was speaking to him the bird lost height and landed in a distant oak, still in view. He and Mike Tyler soon joined us and we watched the bird (albiet distant) shuffling about in this tree being harrased by a couple of Crows and Magpies. After alerting all the local birders I could get hold off (Gav?) I had to press on and set some nets up. After a while Frazer and Mike also left the bird, and between that and the arrival of Bun and Karen, it managed to slip away. I really should have said stuff the ringing and stayed and watch the bird, it would have been useful to see where it went, sorry guys.

We caught a few bits and bobs, including a juv Cett's Warbler. Also found an egg in the reedbed which Peter identified as a Water Rails egg, it was intact so probably had been washed out.

 

[Gavin Haig]

So! The ringing finally pays off handsomely....shame it wasn't in a net! |=)|

The patch list creeps up another notch.

 

[KarenWoolley]

Yes, as Steve has mentioned great start to the week/day for me, with another nice dip. I only had about a half hour to spare this morning to take a look, it was just long enough to get wet, muddy and NOT see the Honey Buzzard. I was in such a hurry I had to RUN!! all the way back to the car.

Still I was happy to see how windy it was and as soon as I got back from the school run I sped down to the shelter for some seawatching. Ian was there and had already seen an Arctic Skua and plenty of Manxies. Whilst Ian was temporarily absent I noticed a Shearwater heading east fairly close in, It was a Balearic Shearwater. I thought Ian would miss it but fortunately it started heading west, then east again and finally landed on the sea near to the westernmost flag. When Ian returned I managed to get him on it and we watched it for a good while as it lingered and fed , superb views!! Certainly the best I've ever had of this species and it made up for the earlier dip!! |=)|

It's still pretty windy so I'm off for another look at the sea in a minute.


EDIT: Well, I went, but the wind had abated somewhat and the sea was much calmer. I still gave it an hour however (17:00 - 18:00), it was predictably slow. I'm tempted to say I wish I hadn't bothered but that wouldn't really be true. It appears I have developed a masochistic streak which, always forces me to enjoy it even if there are few birds!

Massive totals were:

Gannet 19W/1E, Sandwich Tern 4, Manx Shearwater 7.

I also neglected to mention earlier ( I'd left notebook in car) that I also did a lunchtime seawatch/dogwalk from the yacht club (12:10 - 13:30). Better totals were:

Gannet 19, Common Scoter 7, Whimbrel 2, Sandwich Tern 1, Commic Tern 2, Kittiwake 4, Manx Shearwater 40W/4E and Auk sp 1 (most probably Puffin ).

PS - Steve, am I correct in believing I get 15 points for Balearic Shearwater it being a June bird? Also, although it's pretty obvious to everyone that as far as the Backwater Birding Bonanza is concerned you're 'home and hosed' could we still have an update on the scores, if only to see just how far behind us 'lesser mortals' are!!

 

[Steve Waite]

One million out of ten for effort Karen. Just been out for an hour, lovely first-summer Hobby hawking around over the farm gate, maybe the same bird from Lower Bruckland a couple of weeks ago? Just had a Ringlet in the garden, first of the year!

 

[Simon Wakely]

Same old routine, sat in the garden for hours this evening. And a considerably more successful and milder evening than last night was enjoyed.

• Attached picture of Mrs.Great-Spotted Woodpecker, eyeing me up behind the refuge of my apple tree branch.
• At 21:30, the Barn Owl made his (assuming it's a he, we're not sure), best appearance yet. He flew along the railway line looking for vulnerable rodents, then swooped the length of the garden, and returned to circle briefly over my head, before flying away between the two apple trees at the end of the garden.

Happy Birding,
Simon & Sue Wakely :king:

 

[KarenWoolley]

I nearly had a bird free day today, I did however have a bit of spare time late afternoon and somehow found myself on the yacht club carpark.................|=)|

Might as well get the scope out for a bit, I thought, I watched from 5:40 to 6:10 and saw only FIVE birds; 2 Cormorants, 2 Gannets and 'honestly it's true' a Balearic Shearwater. It was, incredibly, the first bird I saw, almost immediately I started looking. It was close in again (just infront of outer flag) and flying east. As I panned infront of it for the third time and waited for it to fly through my field of view it didn't, must have landed on the sea again, but I couldn't relocate it.

 

[bun]

Evening folks, took my scope and bins to work today - was hoping to do some seawatching after work, was just about to finish when it rained, then rained, and rained some more forcing me to unblock drains, clear up debris and hand out sandbags until about 19.00ish...i then went home looking like a drowned rat, cold, wet and miserable!....O" well it will soon be summer?!?!

 

[Steve Waite]

Little from me today.

In my lunchbreak the Pale-bellied Brent was again off Coronation Corner, and at dusk in the back yard of Co-op, a Hummingbird Hawkmoth came to investigate my strawberries!!

 

[Simon Wakely]

Evening fellow birders,

Attached are 3 photos;
1. A jay - this photo was taken this morning
2. A small sample of the literally hundreds of rooks that roost in the woodland opposite, just after dusk this evening.
3. A juvenile Great-Spotted Woodpecker, shown by its vivid red head, this photo was taken yesterday.

Today's report;
• A Hobby unsuccessfully decided to try and catch some of our juvenile tits this morning.
• A huge dark brown bird, with Buzzard-esque features, a brown body, with a white tail and dark bands on the end, very slim winged, we are unsure quite what bird this was.
• A juvenile Cuckoo was seen resting on some power lines across the street, a few photo were taken, but need to be made clearer before being put up on here.

Unfortunately no Barn Owl tonight. The forum seems to be following a very maritime path recently, and turning up some fantastic spots, so I hope these posts are showing a fair representation of the slightly more inland and woodland birds.

Happy Birding,
Simon & Sue Wakely :t:

 

[Andrew]

Eight more posts and it will be the 2500th post! Race on!

Worthy thread.

Edit : Now, behave yourself James!

 

[Ranger James]

Eight more posts and it will be the 2500th post! Race on!

Worthy thread.

Wouldn't it be dreadful for the 2500th post to be a really bland one?

 

[Ranger James]

I mean, really boring. Nothing to do with birds.

 

[kmonty1950]

Simon,

Your garden really looks brilliant. Whereabouts are you roughly in relation to the estuary (obviously without giving too much away).

Good (garden) birding!

Ken.

 

[Simon Wakely]

Simon,

Your garden really looks brilliant. Whereabouts are you roughly in relation to the estuary (obviously without giving too much away).

Good (garden) birding!

Ken.

Ken - Cheers, the new garden is a dream come true. It is approximately 4 miles to estuary itself, maybe a bit less as the crow flies. Not too far to get the odd gull, but woodpeckers are flourishing here.

Today's report;
• Firstly, the juvenile Cuckoo photo from last night is too much of a blurry mess to be worth putting up on here, although acceptable for a personal reference. We've seen them flying, but never seen them posing so well on an electricity wire, which makes the disappointing outcome of the pictures more of a shame, especially as it is the first juvenile Cuckoo we've ever seen.
• Went and had a look at Norcombe's Corner for the first time in a long while, but saw nothing, although it was nice to head back and have a look.
And the garden this evening;
• A Green Woodpecker was heard calling.
It was windy enough to have blown our heads off, but we dont give in, still undefeated birders, unfortunately nothing else much was seen this evening, and therefore, no new pictures. Hope to be back up to my usual fruitful reports soon, weather permitting.

Happy Birding,
Simon & Sue Wakely.

 

[Steve Waite]

Lovely weather isn't it!!!

Seeing as my alarm failed to wake me yesterday morning, I just had to head down to the seaside early this morning - I chose Branscombe as my destination. I sea watched 05:30 - 09:00, with some nice highlights, all in all it was rather good stuff!!!!
All west unless stated: 113 Gannet (11E), 132 Manx Shearwaters, 1 Balearic Shearwater (W at 08:50 with 3 Manx, my first this year), 3 Storm Petrels (1 feeding distantly at 06:25 first spotted when I zoomed up on a Shearwater, 1 W at 08:00 and finally another single W at 08:40, the latter being a close one too, nice!!), 11 Common Scoter (3E), 1 Shelduck (E), 5 Curlew, 1 Whimbrel, 3 Arctic Skuas (paleish sub-adult W at 06:00, dark phased W at 06:20 and another paleish sub-adult W at 07:35, all three nice and close), 2 Black-headed Gulls, 1 Mediterranean Gull (1st summer W with 3 Sarnie Terns), 21 Kittiwakes (1E), 11 Sandwich Terns and 5 Razorbill. Miles better than your average June seawatch!!!!

Afterwards on the river a drake Shoveler. Forgot to mention, Monday just gone I saw the two Gypo Geese on Colyford Marsh, they've been rather elusive of late.

EDIT: Just nipped down to Colyford Common. A Green Sandpiper was on the scrape, 35 Curlew flew down river and a nice highlight, just as I was about to leave, the first juvenile Black-headed Gull of the autumn dropped in on to the scrape to join 65 older ones!

 

[bun]

Managed a sea watch after work today 16.30-18.00 - the wind had dropped off considerably and the sea though choppy had also calmed down a touch - in my logbook are the following - 55 manx shearwaters (w), 35 Gannet (28 w) 7 lingering, 3 sandwich terns (w) 3 commic terns (w) and best of all a storm petrel - lingering and feeding, giving good views through the scope quite close in, so a enjoyable hour and a half all in all.

 

[Simon Wakely]

Garden tonight,
J / green + adult green woodpecker, male g/s woodpecker, large flock of long tailed tits. Thousands of rooks roosting in woodlands opposite our bungalow tonight, more seems to be coming each evening.
By the way Bill Oddie has signed our pictures of the Egyptian geese mating.
Happy birding Simon + Sue Wakely.

 

[KarenWoolley]

Bun - 55 Manxies! Ian and I had 6 between 4 and 5:10 from the shelter, did they start late on? Having said that I had 29 Manxies from the yacht club earlier in the same hour as Gav and Ian had 11 or 12 from the shelter, so it seems to depend somewhat on viewing location. Also I only saw 2 Sandwich Terns and Gav and Ian saw quite a few more I think?

Well spotted on the Stormie Bun! Everyone who's looked has seen one today except me! ||

Gav - notice that's 29 Manxies, not the 39 I told you earlier. Can you believe I added up 14 and 15 to 39!?? |:$|. Actually, don't answer that!!!

EDIT: Birds seen were: 29 Manx Shearwater, 2 Sandwich Tern, and 2 Auk sp. all west, and quite a few Gannet (I didn't count these as many were loitering).