It's spring up north

A real change of scenery this weekend- the Sheffield Ten if you like- and a more different birdwatching experience would be hard to find within a few hours drive of Ely. Subtle nuances exist of course, like the abundance of Willow Warblers and Chaffinches with northern accents, but there are a few species that thrive in the woods and dales of Yorkshire that, at home, are seen only fleetingly as they pass through. On last weekend's birdrace we found them all but impossible, but in the right place, at the right time....

Cheese (and the lost age of kodascoping)

Digiscoping still amazes me.  As a teen I bought some chunky adapter that allowed me to attach my even chunkier Zenit SLR to my treasured Bausch and Lomb Discovery Telescope.  I was chuffed to pieces to be able to take some shots of Osprey and Curlew Sandpiper, after painstaking stalking, which smudged onto Kodachrome celluloid to remind me in the depths of a Yorkshire winter that for a glorious fortnight during the summer, Stithians Reservoir in Cornwall had become my patch.

The sheer ease now of placing a cheap, palm sized camera up to the lens of your scope and being able to choose between grabbing a half decent record shot or  filming in HD video boggles and excites me in equal amounts.  I've not really looked after my last little Lumix snappy camera too well and somewhere along the line it got some watery residue on the internal lens system that could be seen as scratches on images and just wouldn't shift.  So I bought an new, older high spec Lumix on the web through Amazon but the blighter didn't turn up - my very first internet purchase sting.  Having been reimbursed I bought a new new one instead and it arrived in the post yesterday.  Keen to give it a whirl I popped down to the little wadery pool  opposite Cuckoo Bridge to see if the LRP would say cheese.  Which it did along with some not so Black-headed Gulls.

 

What is even more boggling to a semi-luddite such as I, is that you can use your mobile phone, where my first one looked like this (and I'm only on my 5th one now 17 years later)............

 



 

 

to take photo's down your scope of stunners like this.

 

 

 

Viva Technology..........

 



Smashing Plovers and Stonking Gulls

 

The Birdrace was a tiring but great treat.  Some good birding with good folk, highlights abound but there is little time to really drink in any of the exquisite birding scenes.  However in the Ely10 we had some memorable moments.  A Crane that glided in and around  one of our reedbed reserves lit brightly through cloud breaks to the south against a charcoal, brooding rainstorm sky was a vivid image to savour.  There were plenty of dramatic skyscapes during a very changeable day.

 

 

A late and exceptionally smart Caspian Gull near Pymoor was a true surprise and one of the best I've seen in the Ely10 (or anywhere else for that matter) Simon's pictures through the phone give an impression and certainly leave no doubt to the identity of this lovely Larid.  A Mediterranean Gull on territory just outside the Ely10 was equally smart. 

 

 

 

 

Isleham Water Meadows delivered a russet Black-tailed Godwit, a Dunlin with an ink dipped belly and a plum dappled male Ruff, along with the resident Avocets.  At the settling beds our only Little Ringed Plover of the day showed very well and the next day I had to return to watch it some more.  A couple of Common Sandpiper and a Little Egret have also taken up a residence on the small pool with some nice looking muddy edges, so nice that a spanking Dunlin dropped in for an hour or so on Wednesday evening, we can only hope and dream of a Stint doing the same in the weeks to come. 

 

Today I went to check the pool and the LRP started the cocked head, eyes to the sky flicker that suggests danger in the air.  I looked to the Black-headed Gulls who were giving subtler but similar signals.  Not one to ignore natures hints I popped my head out of the car to check the sky above and indeed a big old Peregrine was cruising over and took a leisurely foray into sweeping spirals above the dark fenland fields as it gained height. 

 

Perhaps it's time to give the Cathedral another check............     



The longest day

Last weekend most sensible birdwatchers took in their local patch or, like Will, stayed at home and enjoyed the fruits of Spring, just happy to have birds around them. Some of us had bigger fish to fry- and by fish I mean birds- and by fry, I mean see- and by bigger, I mean as many as we could in a twenty four hour period- some of us had as many birds to see as we could in a twenty four hour period. Within the county. This is their story.

Many years ago I joined Duncan, Mark, and Jono on a birdrace around the county. We set a new inland county record that was broken the following year. Now we wanted that record back. With Jono up north somewhere, the first thing to do was recruit a fourth member of the team. Simon stepped up to the plate. The four of us had already embarked on some great birding feats together- driving for a week across the land of the Midnight Sun in Norway and Finland, circumnavigating the Mahgrebian desert, attacking ships on fire at the tannhauser gate- no hang on – that last one’s from Bladerunner- did I dream about rescuing a couple of droids from the Empire……yes, I think that was a dream. I am still very tired.

What was not a dream was meeting up with the team at Woodwalton Fen at midnight on Saturday. Now, the first rule of birdrace is that you make sure you get enough rest beforehand. With this in mind I was up at 5:30 am, Saturday morning to do a bit of last minute reconnaissance. I fully intended to get some sleep in the afternoon, but the excitement was too much and I arrived at Woodwalton having had a total of one hour’s interrupted sleep in the last eighteen. This was a worry.

The weather report was unfavourable, but the night had yet to turn for the worse as we set off. We were soon surrounded by singing Sedge Warblers and Grasshopper Warblers, and deer rustled in the darkness ahead of us- but there were no Nightingales and no owls. In the past these species were a given here, but the lack of piercing melodies and squeaking gate calls cast an ominous pall over our carefully planned stratagem. Fearing that the weather would break soon we rushed over to the Nene Washes. A gentle breeze was blowing, but we heard Spotted Crake and Corncrake, and our confidence returned.

Dawn revealed to us that our new found confidence was maybe akin to that shown by a mouse who walks into a catshop after his friends have told him that if he holds his breath, the cats won’t see him. After twenty minutes it was obvious that the cats could see us. The washes were dry. There were no flocks of waders and waterfowl, no great masses of herons, no cranes. A Whooper Swan was there, and we foolishly took this as a sign of encouragement. Breakfast at McDonalds- felt dirty.

It started raining, and we started driving. I have no idea where we went- I was in the back of the car and I don’t know the west of the county that well anyway. We stopped at some kind of industrial complex and saw a Peregrine perched on a tall chimney. It took off almost immediately and was lost to view- we were lucky. Then we found ourselves at a lock looking for Grey Wagtail. We were not lucky. This could a problem. We needed the easy birds to be, well, easy. If they were going to play hard to get this whole record breaking attempt was going to be like trying to convince an American that intelligent life exists on all six of the other continents- difficult and ultimately futile. Somewhat tired now- eat some peanuts.

Things improved at Monk’s Wood, where, in the space of five minutes and standing in one place, we saw Nuthatch, Treecreeper and Marsh Tit- it was back on. If we kept this rate up we could smash the record in four hours! Bombay mix!

Four hours later we had not even come close to breaking the record. We’d be lucky to do it in four days if our luck didn’t change. Paxton gave us some hope, with a Great Northern Diver, Red Kite, Whimbrel and Bar-tailed Godwit encouraging highlights, but we began to fall into a trance every time we stood and scanned the scene before us through our telescopes. The car journeys between sites became quieter, and despite Dunc’s rousing call to arms- if you can call it that- it was more like a tired plea from an orange suited victim to stop the waterboarding- we were beginning to face up to the fact that we might well fall short. By mid afternoon we had still not seen a Sparrowhawk.

The odd good bird here and there kept us in the hunt but it wasn’t enough. A Mediterranean Gull at Needingworth, Hobbies at Ouse Fen, Wheatear at fen Drayton, good birds one and all and would have normally meant that a good day’s birdwatching was being had, but where were the kingfishers, the Turtle Doves and the Corn Buntings? Very tired now. Get the muffins out.

At Wicken we bumped into the Balmfords as they enjoyed a nice stroll round the fen, and I envied their unhurried afternoon birding. We had no time to stand and stare, and left having not seen the Black-necked Grebes. Only the day before I had arrived at the same spot and seen them immediately, and I quite reasonably assumed it was going to be simple to see them again, when it mattered. With time beginning to run out we had to start making difficult choices, and we couldn’t hang around looking for just one bird. As we drove away James Hanlon sent us a picture he had just taken- of a Black-necked Grebe.

I think it was that moment that finally broke us. We soldiered on to Isleham and then to Pymoor, dropping in to Tony Martin’s place on the way, and Ruff, Caspian Gull and Wigeon were added to the list. Very, very tired.

The birds had simply not been there. The migrants had not migrated and the residents were not at home. The Glossy Ibis had suddenly decided that after weeks of being at Fen Drayton it no longer liked the place. We could have carried on into the night, and bystanders would have seen four ghostly shapes haunting the edge of Cambridgeshire like zombies, listening for the wailing of Stone Curlew, crunching the last of the Bombay mix- but enough was enough and we resigned to our fate, retreating from the battlefield before total annihilation.

120  was the final score. It felt like a heavy loss and we couldn’t quite believe we had fallen so far short of the magic 136. Four days on and I still haven’t seen a Sparrowhawk. There was a Turtle Dove purring down at Roswell Pits this morning- where was that on Sunday?

Blackbird bonanza

Given its modest dimensions, it doesn't take much to dominate our garden, but, regardless, it has been well and truly dominated by Blackbirds of late. Regular, if not daily, visitors over the Winter months, they seemed to become permanent fixtures over the last 3 or 4 weeks. Then, a week ago, youngsters appeared; first one, quickly followed by two and finally, we realised, three. They tucked themselves away in Ceanothus and Winter Hyacinth but their presence was betrayed by frequent visits from their parents. Then one day they had vanished, only to all reappear the next day and this pattern continued, culminating in them sitting more openly in the Ceanothus yesterday, making a racket every time a parent appeared - which they did with astonishing regularity - just how do they find all that food, often without leaving the boundaries of our garden? So busy were the family that we postponed planned gardening tasks and left the garden to them. Today, nothing, save two quick glimpses of the male. At one stage general alarm caused me to look up and see a Sparrowhawk circling round. I found myself sparing a thought for 'our' birds and hoping they were safe. Perhaps they'll be back tomorrow, or perhaps it's already goodbye. Whichever, we're taking it as a sign of approval for all the work we've put into the garden over recent months and hope that Blackbirds continue to find it to their liking.

Seen-Unseen

 There are birds that are timid, and those that are more inquisitive, sometimes to the point of boldness. At Wicken this morning a Whitethroat flew along the ditch and landed in front of me, perching at the top of a small hawthorn. He sat for a few minutes rasping and twittering as if trying to attract my attention. Across the path, however a pair of Grey partridge seemed to think they could disappear from view if they just crouched down a little and stayed still and silent.

One bird managed to be noticed while still remain invisible. The churring could be heard from a distance, and I was able to work out exactly where the noise was coming from, but knowing and seeing are two different things.........

Certhia less than familiar

Glorious! Treecreepers are breeding at Roswell Pits. I've seen a couple in past winters, but never in the breeding season. Having had two sightings recently down between the railway and the small pit, I thought there must be a good chance of it- or more appropriately, them- nesting nearby. I picked up the needle thin call and turned round just in time to see the tiny thing dart into a line of shrubs. Through my binoculars I could see that it's bill was stuffed with small insects- and the chase was on. It flew across the open space and past a heavily coppiced willow, diving into the ivy clad tangle of leaning trunks that stand at the beginning of the spit at the entrance the pit. Having lost it to view, I had to listen to make sure it was still in the vicinity. It was, and it soon emerged, only to disappear almost immediately. Moving round the tree, I noticed a long fissure, about ten feet up, and everything fell into place.

On Spring.

Rise from your slumber, Prince of Reverie

'Tis not the house-cat but the Turtle Dove that purrs.

'Tis not the schoolyard but the gibbering of the Blackcap in his hedge.

It is the Willow warbler descending Lethe-wards from the catkin,

Where once fell the autumn leaf.

It is not the Robin but the Start, 

His stay all too brief.

Now lets do birding! that Pied fly's not going to find himself, no matter how much therapy he's had!

wouldn't it be nice

Of nostalgia.........

I won't be making any apologies for the rambling nature of this post as nostalgia, incorporating the key components of my birding experience - romance and existentialism, is emotionally rooted and therefore tends towards the non linear and in my case the nonsensical. 

 

This weeks birding has been good. I spent last weekend on the Suffolk coast and during the week managed to top and tail my working days and family time with the Ring Ouzels, a Black Redstart, the Garganey and a Spoonbill amongst the excitement of continual migration and breeding bird activity within the Ely10. 

 

I was at Minsmere before dawn last Sunday and had the reserve to myself for an hour or so.  Drinking in the sights and sounds I left the moment and found myself reminiscing about each of my visits and walks around this fabulous, and bird rich, mosaic of habitats.  I realised that it was 30 years (give or take a week) since my very first visit here as a 10 year old lad.  I can't begin to describe the totality of overwhelming excitement I experienced during those first visits.  Looking back with greater knowledge I now understand that it is the effects of dopamine, which was released copiously when I saw each new and long imagined bird back in the day, to which I have become addicted.  How fortunate that the simple act of walking around outdoors experiencing the world around me and bumping into birds, which to me have some meaning and context, can release this highly addictive biochemical reward. For this birding compulsion is now neurologically wired within me and continues now, setting my pulse a quickened and heightening all senses and experience of the moment when an Avocet simply gets on with it's business just metres in front of me. 

 



 

A couple of years after that first visit to Minsmere I won, with childhood birding buddy Jono Leadley (check out his blog at http://birdingdad.blogspot.co.uk/ ), a signed..... thank you very much, copy of The Big Bird Race at the RSPB/YOC Conference's bird quiz.  I fell in love with it and I have read it at least once a year ever since. If you haven't read it, birder or not, then you should because it takes you into the field and into that race to see as many species in a day as possible. Jono and I felt for this book so dearly that we read long extracts from it for our GCSE English speaking grades.  Meeting up with our Cambs Bird Race team earlier this week we mused on this book and how great and significant it is to us to be bird racing around the Ely Wildspace with Tim Inskipp, one of the birding heroes from the TBBR. 

 

A fortnight ago and my wife turned 40.  She had a sizeable gathering of friends old and new.  Good times were had over the weekend festivities, particularly impressive considering that she had a four week old clamped to her for most of the time and a four year old biting at her heels.  The ale flowed and a graphic illustrator friend, who had travelled an admiral distance from Northumbria, gave me a belated birthday card with a Robert Gillmor linocut of a Heron standing proud on the front.  I don't need much excuse to dust off my bird books and I jumped at the chance to share "Cutting Away", a fantastic anthology of Gillmor's prints with someone who would really appreciate the stylisation, graphic confidence and technical craft of the work.  I think for many British birders Robert's images are an intrinsic part of their wider birding experience and are as iconic and memorable as those first visits to reserves such as Minsmere and Titchwell. 

 

 

Earlier this week I was dropping into classes at school and went into a Year 9 Art class where they were doing their first linocuts.  I couldn't help myself and, through the wonder of t'internet, was able to show the class a range of Robert Gillmors work and some pictures of him working in his studio.  I focused upon the 2 pieces below with the kids as I think, although they are of the Norfolk countryside, they have a resonance for anyone who has spent time in the Fens and has ventured a little way of the beaten track. 

 

 

I have spent too many hours in airports and to while away those hours there is a great game to play spotting look alikes, the more subjective the better.  A fair few years ago now,  a birding holiday to Spain with Ben unfortunately incorporated the pan-European mother of all disruptions caused by the Icelandic volcanic ash cloud and we found ourselves playing a very long game.  We did find the real deal over the holiday and Heather Mills-McCartney on her way to a skiing trip, and Kerry Catona with attendant reaity TV camera crew were duly ticked.  One fella with an uncanny resemblance to a young Robert De Niro (and didn't he know it) was a highlight but after 24 hours looking through the same stranded folk in Madrid terminal 1, we ended up resorting to the dubious but hilarious stereotypes game of locating "men who look like old lesbians" - http://menwholooklikeoldlesbians.blogspot.co.uk/ ...Bear with please, bear with....

 

So serendipity prevailed.  Having pottered out in the Camper today, via the garden centre, to Mepal Airfield and not seen a Ring Ouzel (although there is at least one still there per Mr Green) or a long gone Black Redstart (a find that really deserves to have it's picture or even a painting on the blog) I pulled in to the BP garage on Witcham Road for Diesel. 

 

Gazing across the A10 and daydreaming of Ospreys, I saw a look-a likey for Robert Gillmor walking across the forecourt.  The downside of playing this game, with the subjectivity rules intact, is that many complete strangers can become very familiar looking.  I went in to pay and was more than 80% convinced that the man just behind me in the queue was indeed the artist himself. In the past a certain shyness and apprehension would have curtailed me from speaking up but I guess I'm more than pretending to be a grown up now and decided to strike up a conversation on the basis that he looked familiar and, when I enquired, was met with a positive response from Mr Gillmor.  He was really very lovely and I was able to share the classroom story and my enjoyment of his work.  He asked about the Arctic Terns on my arm so I was able to big up Ben's artistry and he invited me to drop into his studio if I was passing Cley in the future.   Needless to say I was buzzing.  I have been prone, like most, to flirt with the notion that random chance, given meaning and significance by our prior experiences or knowledge, belies something more than co-incidence.  Today however I'm happy to just sit back and enjoy the nostalgia, serendipity and meaningful reflections and connections with the birding child within.  

 

A lovely print by Northumbrian artist LJ Le Rolland

http://www.ljlerolland.com/‘bittersweet’-botanical-illustrations

Dapper dabbler

Half an hour down the settling beds almost involved queuing up for parking as Ben, Rich and Neal had all had the same notion, with some Tern and Little Gull movement going on elsewhere in the county it was always worth a look.  Although there were no surface dippers there were some dashing duck in the form of the Garganey which have taken up a secretive residence.

 

 

 

A posse of Yellow Wagtails came in of the fields to roost and further up river a pair of Comnmon Sandpiper bobbed and giggled maniacally.  With migration in full flow it really is the most wonderful time of the year. 

Biarmy morning Acro-noon

It's been a long time since I last visited Ouse Fen, the part reedbed, part aggregate extraction plant just south of Earith. It's not quite in the Ely Ten, but it does have many of the species that we normally find close to the Cathedral, and in good numbers. Bitterns, Marsh harriers, various ducks, all in a relatively small area, have attained unparallelled densities of population. There were three booming Bitterns within a few hundred metres of each other, and the harriers filled the sky like spring Buzzards in a kettle.

It was the smaller, closer world of reed margin and drain bank that caught my eye though. Everywhere, it seemed, acrocephalus warblers scuttled through the dry stems, bragging and whistling loudly from cover, then darting across a gap, chasing the neighbours in early season boundary disputes. Every now and then I came across a pair of Reedlings, pinging and ricocheting amongst last years seed heads. These bearded wonders are so unlike any other British bird, and it's often a struggle to see them well, but when you do they tend put on a good show. Of all the reedbed birds it's the Bearded Tits that act as weather vanes, coming out in the open on hot sunny days- shy and retiring as the temperature drops.

Citrinella morning

Isn't it funny how a short walk can turn into a three hour stroll when the weather is nice. Thistle Corner Drove was full of birdlife this morning, from the very start, where a Whitethroat has moved in to the bank of brambles that the Linnets are nesting in, to the bank of the river where the track eventually stops, where, in another bramble a Sedge Warbler was singing while a pair of Reed Buntings twitched around the rank vegetation. A pair of Bullfinches busily nipping the buds by the railway were startled by an oncoming train packed with commuters, and I felt lucky. Blackcaps sung in every piece of available habitat. For a short period after their arrival, the Blackcap males are too caught up in their singing contests to notice anything that doesn't make a noise. they will shout at anything that makes a sound vaguely similar to their own chatter and aren't afraid to step into the open. One male I'm sure was taking on a whole flock of Linnets, and his volume certainly matched that of the wittering from across the way. The females stay for the most part in cover, but every now and again they can be glimpsed as they forage through the gappy hawthorns. A lone Willow Warbler was evidence of a slow and gradual return- numbers do seem to be down when compared to the other usual migrants. Out across the fields the Barn owl was hunting again, and a few Skylarks twinkled in the blue. 

A couple of weeks ago I had gone out to try and record the Yellowhammers, and had failed, only to get the consolation of some close views of the Owl. Today I was lucky, and saw four or five birds. They are another species that, like the Willow Warbler and many others, have fallen on hard times. There is nothing that embodies a warm country lane like a singing Yellowhammer. Cowslip-coloured head and maple bark streaked back, it's soporific tune spreads along the hedge like a shaft of sunlight. You can't help but stand and stare.

                                   

mist and migrants

A very misty morning forced us to use our ears more than our eyes, as we picked out a singing Lesser Whitethroat, and Reed and Sedge Warblers at Turbotsey Pond. Rich went off to work and, when the sky cleared, I drove down to Mepal to see if the Ouzels were still about.
They were- and I managed to edge closer and closer to them. After a while I left them and walked across the field to investigate the pipits that were flying about. The Sun caused a slight haze, and the scene before me was almost reminiscent of an African plain, with small thorn bushes creeping across the dried grassland. I could almost sense a Lion sleeping in the thicker scrub.
What I saw, however, was more like a Cheetah. A sudden start and a scatter of birds pre-empted the quick dash of Sparrowhawk. An impossibly tight turn as it overshot it's target was not quite tight enough, and the Blackbird now had just enough lead and open air to avoid capture.
It wasn't long before the thrushes emerged from cover, the Ouzels hopping languidly over the turf alongside a few Blackbirds and a Song Thrush, each one every so often glancing upwards, danger still fresh in their minds. Two Buzzards drifted over and the thrushes hid again, and this time they stayed closer to the brambles.