{"id":23400,"date":"2018-03-09T17:55:14","date_gmt":"2018-03-09T17:55:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.simplybirdsandmoths.co.uk\/sbam\/?p=23400"},"modified":"2018-03-09T17:55:14","modified_gmt":"2018-03-09T17:55:14","slug":"a-pair-of-black-necked-grebes-on-my-patch","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.simplybirdsandmoths.co.uk\/sbam\/a-pair-of-black-necked-grebes-on-my-patch\/","title":{"rendered":"A pair of Black-necked Grebes on my Patch"},"content":{"rendered":"

On Sunday afternoon, 4th March 2018, I decided to pay my patch a visit, as I had not been for a few days and wasn’t able to get Sunday morning<\/strong><\/span>. I parked my car in the dam car park and began to scan the water. At first glance, noticing only the usual suspects – Cormorant, Coot, Great Crested Grebe, Mallard and Tufted Duck. Keep scanning I said to myself, something will surely turn up. It did, I picked up on a small wader that flew into my field of view. Tracking it across the water, I noticed it was a Dunlin<\/span>. A good bird for Staunton Harold Reservoir and the first since 2012.<\/p>\n

I decide to scope the dam wall to see if I could re-locate it and as I scanned the dam edge and through the large flock of Great Crested Grebes, much to my delight, I discovered a smaller greyish grebe that was asleep. I immediately knew it was either a Black-necked or a Slavonian Grebe, both of which are rare birds for Derbyshire, let alone Staunton Harold. Eventually it woke up and sure enough it was a Black-necked Grebe<\/span> in winter plumage. A “Red Letter” afternoon. Two good birds within 20 minutes.<\/p>\n

I wasn’t able to get back to the reservoir until Wednesday morning 7th March and decided to call in on my way to work. After checking the dam wall area I started scanning the far side of the reservoir and picked up 2 small grebes that were diving. As they were distant I needed my scope and quickly got on them to find they were both Black-necked Grebes. The first record of this species at Staunton Harold since 2002.<\/p>\n

The birds were still present on Friday 9th March and I was able to get a selection of photographs. With careful approach and sitting down quietly by the waters edge, the birds began to display right in front of me – quiet a fantastic few minutes.<\/p>\n

\"\" \"\" \"\" \"\"<\/p>\n

Black-necked Grebe<\/strong> – Staunton Harold Reservoir, Derbyshire – March 9th 2018 – Tony Davison\u00a9<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On Sunday afternoon, 4th March 2018, I decided to pay my patch a visit, as I had not been for a few days and wasn’t able to get Sunday morning. I parked my car in the dam car park and began to scan the water. At first glance, noticing only the usual suspects – Cormorant, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[653,18,651,172],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-23400","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-653","category-birds","category-birdsof2018","category-year"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.simplybirdsandmoths.co.uk\/sbam\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23400","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.simplybirdsandmoths.co.uk\/sbam\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.simplybirdsandmoths.co.uk\/sbam\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.simplybirdsandmoths.co.uk\/sbam\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.simplybirdsandmoths.co.uk\/sbam\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23400"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.simplybirdsandmoths.co.uk\/sbam\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23400\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.simplybirdsandmoths.co.uk\/sbam\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23400"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.simplybirdsandmoths.co.uk\/sbam\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23400"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.simplybirdsandmoths.co.uk\/sbam\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23400"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}