Winter Mission Accomplished!

On the 27^th January, with an early finish from college, I decided to have another crack at checking the local geese. From past experience, the Pink-Foot flock were occasionally viewable from Hartley Road between Holywell Dene and the Delaval Arms, but with the flock being so mobile, I didn’t have the highest hopes of getting a chance to check them. However, on arrival, I headed to my usual spot, and immediately spotted 14 geese in the field. 11 Greylag Geese, and 3 Smaller Geese on their own away from the distant Pink-Footed Goose flock. After setting up my scope, one thought crossed my mind: ‘3 Geese on their own? Pink or Orange Bill?’ And Bingo! 3 Tundra Bean Geese feeding in the field! At this point I rang Joe Dobinson who came along and confirmed them. 5 minutes later, they wandered out of view. We thought that was the last sighting of them, however soon after, the Pink-Footed Goose flock were all flushed up, and the Bean Geese went up with them, and they became even more obvious when flying with Pink-Footed Geese. A great patch tick!

Dirty Twitching! 11/1/14

Yesterday I gave into temptation and went to twitch the American Coot in the Highlands, in the company of Dave Brown and Tom Middleton. Leaving at half 1(am), and arriving at 7, we were soon getting excellent views of the Yanky Coot. After watching it for about 30 mins, we decided to go and look for the Ring-Billed Gull at Dingwall, which gave absolutely mega views on the grass in front of the Academy! Final stop was Loch Garten for Crested Tit and Capercaillie.. No sign of any Capers but...

 CRESTED TIT!! Fantastic birds!

 American Coot

Great views of Ring-Billed Gull

Summary of 2013.

2013 has been an excellent year all round, Northumberland has been incredible! I've had a total of 32 British Ticks and have managed to put a top 10 together, the top 2 was a battle in my mind, but the Bridled Tern can't possibly be beaten I'm afraid, best bird I have ever seen by far. Spent the year in some fantastic company, thanks to everyone who made it so. Here it is!

• 10 - Bluethroat, St. Mary's Island - 25/9/13
• 9 - Long-Tailed Skua, St. Mary's Island - 24/5/13
• 8 - Siberian Stonechat, Howick - 21/10/13
• 7 - Dotterel, Cairn Gorm - 25/5/13
• 6 - Spotted Sandpiper, Alnmouth - 27/7/13
• 5 - Sardinian Warbler, Mire Loch - 6/10/13
• 4 - American Golden Plover, St. Mary's Island - 20/9/13
• 3 - COLLARED FLYCATCHER, Low Newton - 8/5/13
• 2 - IVORY GULL (2), Seahouses - 7/12/13
• 1 - BRIDLED TERN, Inner Farne - 1/7/13

Some photos from 2013:

 By far Patch Bird of the Year, American Golden Plover found by James Spencer, quality.

 Black Redstart (1 of 3 seen at St. Mary's this year), this one found by Dan McGibbon.

 Blue-Headed Wagtail found by myself at St. Mary's in April.

 Cracking Bluethroat found by Nick Dales, huge lifer for me, and at St. Mary's again!

WOW. Look at that. No words can describe how good this really was. BRIDLED TERN on the Farnes. Big thanks to Mike Hodgson and Gary Woodburn for gaining me access to this bird! Found by Will Scott, beauty.

 One of my all time favourite birds, Corncrake from North Uist.

 Dotterel found by me and my dad on Cairn Gorm in May, class.

 Firecrest at St. Mary's, another lifer and long overdue! Well found by John Malloy and Phil Allott.

 Impressive Beasts. Golden Eagles on North Uist.

 Great White Egret at Druridge Pools to complete the 3 Egrets in one year in Northumberland!

Hawfinch at Sizergh Castle, another species I have been chasing for a long time and caught up with for the first time this year.

 Hen Harrier on North Uist, always fantastic!

 Very narrowly missing out on Bird(s) of the Year!! 2 IVORY GULLS at Seahouses Golf Course found by Gary Woodburn initially, simply incredible!

Pallid Swift at Hartlepool Headland, found by Simon Parnaby, a record up for discussion but happy to have it myself!

Cairn Gorm Classic! Ptarmigan at the Ski Centre. 

Grip-Back! A bird I have missed 11 times before this one, Red-Backed Shrike FINALLY seen at Seaton Sluice this year, found by Nigel Tinlin. Also had one at St. Mary's later in the month! 

Female Scaup on St. Mary's Wetland found by myself, later on saw 4 on the sea. 

Siberian Stonechat at Howick, been desperate to see one for years now, and got 2 in 2 days with the North Yorkshire bird the day before! 

Western Bonelli's Warbler at Hartlepool, very good NE record! 

A year wouldn't be complete without these beauties, Yellow-Browed Warbler at St. Mary's, another good year for them.

Double Act...

On Friday night, I was set to go to Lancashire for the Baikal Teal, but in a bizarre turn of events involving a faulty burglar alarm in our house that kept me awake until 4 o'clock, I decided to stay at home, and what a decision that turned out to be.. At half 12 on Saturday, I noticed a tweet from Will Scott in a mad panic after coming off the Farnes, saying he was watching an Ivory Gull at Seahouses! Panic set in, and an hour later, me and Dan were there and getting fantastic views of it on the golf course, flying 10 foot away from us at some points!! Then the bird went out of sight for 5 minutes, and after a while it drifted back over from the trees with another gull, I didn't even look at the other one, until I heard the shout 'THERE'S TWO OF THEM!!', followed by many expletives, and there was a second juvenile IVORY GULL with the first!!! They drifted off towards Beadnell, so everyone piled back into their cars and headed along the road, and following another report saying they were both on the seaweed at Beadnell Beach, we were watching them again on the beach!! 2 IVORY GULLS TOGETHER IN NORTHUMBERLAND?! Fantastic day! And a win at Man United, perfect!

IVORY GULLS!!

Past few days on the patch..

Nice week or so at St. Mary's, with the arrival of my new scope, I was itching to get it out. To kick things off, I located the Med Gull with the Black-Head flock yesterday, and today found a cracking juvenile Scaup on the wetland! I was over the moon with this bird, and only the second time I have seen one on patch, the first time being seawatching fly-bys! Wetland first! Also had a Black Redstart on the rocks on the island last week.

 Black Redstart

 Scaup

Med Gull

This Weeks Birding

Thursday saw me heading for Hartlepool Headland early doors with Tom M and Dan McG for Western Bonelli's Warbler, we gained some excellent views of that bird and also managed Mealy Redpoll in the hand there. Sunday saw me back at Hartlepool Headland for the Pallid Swift, Dusky Warbler and Bonelli's again, getting good views of all again! Me and Dan then went with Andrew K and Michael M to North Yorkshire for the Siberian Stonechat, and got some excellent views of that as well! However we dipped Hoopoe in Notts later in the day thanks to an ignorant photographer who thought 10 feet wasn't close enough, wow. Today saw me flying up to Howick for another Siberian Stonechat which showed even better, becoming my second in two days after only life ticking it yesterday! Excellent few days birding.

Western Bonelli's Warbler

 Mealy Redpoll

 Pallid Swift

Siberian Stonechat

Mad Seawatch 11/10/13

(7:15 - 12:15) and (15:30 - 17:45) seawatches today from St. Mary's - Totalling 7 Busy Hours! Highlight Day Totals:

Sooty Shearwater - 38
Manx Shearwater - 28
Common Scoter - 241
Arctic Skua - 4
Great Skua - 125 (!)
Red-Breasted Merganser - 3
Brent Goose - 20
Red-Throated Diver - 18
Pomarine Skua * - 2
Goldeneye - 5
Velvet Scoter - 3
Long-Tailed Duck - 2
Black-Throated Diver - 2
Great Northern Diver - 3

Can't get enough of this fantastic passage, back for more tomorrow!! Also a couple of grounded migrants today, hopefully more tomorrow, but did get the long-staying Firecrest again and a patch yeartick in the form of Stonechat, putting me on 156.