The last two days at my local patch, Staunton Harold Reservoir, have produced a few good birds. Monday 21st October I had 3 Whooper Swans fly over the reservoir heading SW and then 30 minutes or so later a Red Kite flew over the dam wall. Then today, 22nd October, I found a pair of […]
The Long-billed Dowitcher returned to Willington Gravel Pits on the morning of Saturday 19th October. So I decided to have another attempt at photographing it. This time it seemed settled as it was roosting on a tiny island just from the main hide. It showed for a good 45 minutes before a Sparrowhawk flew through
The last thing I expected to see this morning was a first record for Derbyshire in the form of a 1st winter Long-billed Dowitcher. Found by Steve Porter first thing this morning, it disappeared for nearly 2 hours, before returning to Willington GP around 10:30am. I managed a rush from work arriving on site around
A North American Common Nighthawk was discovered by local anglers hunting along the River Maine at Ballymena, County Antrim, Northern Ireland, in late September, rumour has it. It didn’t take long before birders had been to check it out and sure enough, it was a superb adult male Common Nighthawk. It was then discovered roosting
During the 21st – 28th September 2019 I made my annual birding trip north to the Shetland Isles, staying on the remote island of Unst. Our party of three had a reasonable week searching for migrants and hoping for the odd rarity to turn up. We managed to see a total of 86 species on
Eastern Black-eared and Pied Wheatear identification is notoriously difficult, even more so when a female type arrives in early September. About the right time for Black-eared Wheatear but a little out of season for Pied. The majority of Pied Wheatears seem to be found in late autumn (Oct-Nov). A female, reported as an Eastern Black-eared
An unprecedented event took place in Cornwall during the past week. A Brown Booby was discovered, a new bird to Britain, and spent several days in the Carbis Bay, St.Ives area. It proved elusive and was difficult to connect with. It wasn’t seen on Friday 30th August and so was presumed to have gone by
We spent a few days away on the Island of Mull from 17th to 22nd August. The weather was a mixed bag of rain, wind and some sunshine. Fortunately the weather didn’t disrupt our trip to Iona and the boat trip for White-tailed Eagle that I had pre-booked before we left. This was the highlight
