New birds, old birds, autumn

A couple of weeks ago I was fortunate enough to be in the office when news of a 'possible' American Robin began to spread around the county. As only the fourth record for Devon, and perhaps the first on the mainland, it was quite a draw - add in the fact that the last time I was able to try and twitch (ouch) one, it was last seen the day before I got there. Despite some initial scepticism about the reliability of the sighting, there were plenty of people out searching, so I was able to take a leisurely wander to the site during an extended lunch-break, dodge some nasty, nasty rain showers and see a right beautiful bird before the ravening hordes descended at the weekend.

American Robin. Despite the poor photo, you can see the pale fringes to the greater coverts (halfway down the wing, if you didn't already know!) which age it as a 1st-winter bird. Worth wondering where it came from, as most of the Redwings here in SW England seem to be Scandinavian rather than Icelandic. Speculation all the way!

Soon after this piece of unashamed twitching, I was back on site, leading a training event about waterbird ID and ecology for some colleagues, with the help of a friend of ours. By some unaccountable event, we gathered on one of the two calm, sunny days sandwiched between howling winds and lashing rain. We started with a slow wander up the river from Powderham Church to Turf Locks... Immediately, we were faced with a mixed bag of waders and wildfowl feeding quietly on the rising tide: Black-tailed and Bar-tailed Godwits, Oystercatchers and Curlew, with a smattering of Wigeon and Brent Geese. A raft of female &/or juvenile Red-breasted Mergansers drifted gently upriver, and several small flocks of Avocet and Dunlin flew past.

Early days learning waterbirds... and just how far away waders can be.

 

Powderham marshes in the sunshine

 

Further upriver, we stopped to look at the quantity of bird footprints on the intertidal mud, coming right to the edge of the sea-wall, showing how much of the river the birds use at night when disturbance is lower - and bumped into the tracks of an otter, heading straight out across the mud, tail dragging behind it. First time I've seen evidence of Otter on the Exe myself, though I know several people who've seen the beasts themselves in the area.

Otter tracks - next best thing to seeing an Otter.

A little further on upriver, we were treated to spectacular views of a male Red-breasted Merganser feeding with utter aplomb just a few metres offshore; diving with barely a ripple, then bringing back a number of small fish to the surface where they were then squeezed and manipulated until they slipped down his throat - prompting much speculation as to the sensations experienced by both bird and fish! Can't say the fish gets much of a deal out of it, but there you go.

Drake Red-breasted Merganser, sans fish

Soon after this, we came across a flock of Lapwing doing just exactly what Lapwing do; bobbling around a grassy field amongst a herd of cattle, until a passing motorised parachute-thingy dropped down the marshes, circled the cattle and put them all to flight: a perfect demonstration of the effects of casual disturbance...

A temporary disturbance, but they all add up...

 

Soon after this, whilst we watched a cluster of Black-tailed Godwits probing deep into the mud, Amanda let out a cry of 'Ooh! - a Kingfisher!' and sure enough, there was a smart bird sat on the end of the jetty below Turf Locks, fishing in the canal-Exe confluence, and staying still long enough for everyone to enjoy good views through the telescopes.

Looking to the Turf Locks hotel

 

The gang get to grips with distant blobs, Avocets, Redshank  and godwits

which are all out there. Somewhere.

 

A short while later, we managed to walk past the American Robin - and it's attendant twitchers - without so much as a backwards glance; the first time I've ever managed to walk past a major UK rarity without stopping to look. Weird feeling, I have to confess! After discussing twitchers and their various habits for a short digression, we spent a while scanning the marshes and discussing freshwater waterfowl and waders,from swans to Snipe. The marshes and pools were not particularly busy, compared with how things can be in midwinter, but a liberal dash of Wigeon and Black-tailed Godwit were on the fields, with a smattering of Teal, Shoveler, Tufted Duck, Coot and Gadwall on the pools - a backing track of Water Rail and Cetti's Warblers kept us company from the scrubby ditches.

The Exe from Powderham on a rising tide. 

Finally we tracked back to the cars, then headed downriver to have a look off the back of Dawlish Warren and watch the departing roost. The weather and the tide combined to frustrate us, though, so we had to be content with views across the estuary and a very slowly ebbing tide, with a dusting of ducks up Shutterton Creek and a cloud of Woodpigeon in the adjacent copse.

A few Dartmoor autumn pictures follow, for the hell of it...:

 The ascent of fungi

 Between Hexworthy and Dartmeet

 Dartmeet

 More fungi, but not ascending - more like an exploded brain, really

 

Nuthatch 

Dartmeet

An American on the Exe.

Every second Friday I have a day 'off' (working compressed hours, not skiving!) where I usually get to do the housework, shopping and whichever other miscellaneous chores have built up over the past fortnight. Yay. Yesterday, however, the sun was shining, there were birds to be seen and I had the bonus excuse that I need pics of some of the local waterbirds for a training course I'm running soon. So, down to the Exe I went. I started out at Powderham, where the autumn sun was low and bright, highlighting the turning yellows and browns that are starting to appear in the oaks, and bringing a velvety sheen to the coats of the Fallow Deer which roam the park. The tide was high, so after a cursory look at the mouth of the river Kenn, I headed back to the church and the track leading to the Turf Locks Hotel.

 Little Egret heading upriver at Powderham, Somehow, they always sound so very, very angry when you disturb them.

Powderham Park glowing in the morning sun.

 Powderham marshes doing likewise.

 The Exe, glistening.

Soon after crossing the railway tracks, I noticed a Robin shoot to the top of a low bramble beside a ditch, sit straight up and start calling - he was rapidly joined by a Wren, which rattled and churred like a bird possessed. Very soon, a Stoat's head popped up out of the grass on the ditch edge, and looked coolly at the two birds, before it dropped back into the vegetation and continued hunting whatever it was hunting! The two bird tracked it along the ditch for a good 50 metres, never once letting up on their incessant alarm-calling.To be fair, the Stoat didn't seem at all bothered.

 Stoat, regarding me balefully. I think it resented not being asked whether I could take it's photo, but mindful of the attitude displayed by the Stoats towards Toad, I made sure to keep a safe distance. In any case, I don't carry a cudgel, and Stoats are well known for being armed on a regular basis.

I could see that I wasn't going to have the day all my own way, as bruise-black clouds were building to the north, over Exeter. However, the sun was shining on me and the tide was ebbing, so I pottered on. A couple of flocks of Shelduck and some scattered Grey Plover diverted me for a short time, trying to get some halfway recognisable shots of the latter being rather tricky! Eventually I gave up and moved upriver. A Kingfisher on the rocks was another brief diversion, but unfortunately I managed to fumble the camera.

 Greenshank. No, really.

This couple of Rock Pipits were so intent on beating seven bells of hell out of each other that they completely ignored me. The bird currently on top came out the victor in the end, but not before several air-to-ground tussles which looked, quite frankly, extremely vicious.

 Rock Pipit - the victor.

I then settled down to a bit of a scan of the river, when a plover flew straight upriver past me. 'Hmm' - I thought to myself - 'looks like those pits need a wash'. The penny dropped with an audible clunk, and I worked out I was looking at either a Pacific or an American Golden Plover; the question then being: which one? As it settled, it resolved itself as a nicely greyed-out bird, with a chunky flared supercilium (technical term for what is the equivalent to the eyebrow on a bird) and primaries extending well beyond the tail, with rather short tertials. American Goldie it was - and is still there today, being perved at by dubious-looking men in long flasher-macs.

A truly awful picture of what is in fact a very nice-looking bird. American Golden Plover - see what I mean about the striking supercilium? The reason for the bad picture is that I was holding an old Panasonic Lumix to the eyepiece of a slightly clapped-out telescope. Anything for a record of a rarity, eh?

After that, everything else was bound to be a bit of an anticlimax, but that's life. A couple of Mediterranean Gulls up at Topsham, one bearing a red colour-ring (perhaps from Slovakia, if Dirk Raes' c-r birding projects page is up-to-date) rounded off a decent day.

Today's time was spent lurking around the head of the river, admiring a chunky flock of Black-tailed Godwits - one of which was ringed by my wife in Iceland a few years ago -along with a single Spotted Redshank and a handful of Avocet. A flyover Merlin shoo-ed them all away from the edge of the river, so I met up with a friend, wandered down the west side of the river, and then spent the last of the usable daylight watching the rising tide gradually shunting the Brent Geese and the waders ever closer to the shore by Starcross.

 Black-tailed Godwits (the centre bird is the one Na ringed, hence another poor photo)

 Black-tailed Godwit

Avocets roosting as far away as possible. One of these birds is also colour-marked. Which one?

Starlings in hawthorn

Every so often on the Exe, something out of the ordinary turns up. Sometimes it's from America, sometimes from Asia. Clearly, this Black Swan was fresh in from Australia - apparently unringed and very wary indeed. Or maybe it had just learnt from the Mute Swans around that people aren't to be trusted. Or maybe it had a bad experience with a handler..

A small flock of Redshank flying downhill upriver to roost.

Friends at the weekend

I caught up with some old friends on Saturday. They probably don't recognise me, but that's fine. I don't really know them all that well either (though I'm learning more about them every time I see them!), but we've each been hanging round the Exe every winter since at least the early 1990s. They are, of course, Brent Geese - our standard Dark-bellied Brent (Branta bernicla bernicla). The Exe is actually designated as a Special Protection Area for its wintering bird population, in part for supporting an internationally important proportion of the world's Brent Goose population!

A small proportion of them bear coloured rings on their legs: I first consciously noted this back in the late 1990s or early 2000s and didn't think much of it, and to my shame, didn't follow them properly. Since then, weather, location and girlfriends permitting, I've tried to put in a few mornings each winter to look for marked geese on the river. Each of them has a single ring on each leg, which is usually marked with a letter, a number or a stripe or two - whilst some geese can wear neck-collars, Brent can't, as their neck markings are important social indicators: coloured collars would be likely to affect the behaviour and status of the bird carrying it.

I quickly discovered some constancy in their appearances: I've seen 'O-R2' - a bird with an orange ring with a single black band on the left, and a red ring with a white 2 on the right - most years since 2002, likewise ORR4. Interestingly, some of them seem to stick to particular parts of the estuary too: ORR4 and OYRH seem to prefer the Dawlish Warren and Starcross golf course area, whilst O-R2 and GFGX always seem to be at the northern end of the estuary, round Bowling Green Marsh and Powderham.

 

Typical 'scope view of the Brent at Starcross golf course - a bit gloomy, but nice clean conditions. Lovely short grass. This is the easiest place of all to see colour-marked Brent on the Exe...

 

Zoomed in a little, the old favourite ORR4 can just about be read, despite my grotty photo.

Eventually, I found out something about the origins of these birds. This was a bit of a mixed bag; slight disappointment as many of them were actually ringed on the Exe - so no mega-long-distance between ringing and resighting, but interest when I discovered that most were ringed as adult birds at a series of catches in 1996. This means that the older birds I see are now well in excess of 13 years old - that's no mean feat in itself... It's also just less than half of the current longevity record for a British-ringed Brent, which is a whopping 28 years, 2 months and 12 days between ringing and recovery!

A nice view, if not a nice photo, comparing an adult (centre, no pale fringes to the coverts - the back is a smooth charcoal grey) and bird of the year, with obvious pale fringes making a couple of whitish bars across the coverts. Notice also the lack of a neck collar on the young birds.

Saturday, at Powderham. Eye-candy in the middle, but no fewer than seven colour-ringed birds out of a flock of 250. The difficult thing is getting the numbers when they're faffing about behind the tussocks. A more challenging site...!

Over the years, I have also seen the odd bird which was ringed in Holland (like G1Y- and GRY9) and a couple that were ringed - excitingly - on their breeding grounds, in western Russia (like yellow JX and OKRD) - some 4,500km away from the Exe. So the birds which have survived so long, wintering on the Exe, are flying a corridor 4,500km long, twice every year. As well as all that incidental travel within their home and winter territories. I know it's not the same league as Arctic Tern and Manx Shearwater, but it's pretty good stuff nonetheless.

It's also fun to see that 'my' birds are often seen at other sites during their migration: the Waddensee between Holland, Germany and Denmark is the main place, but they also occasionally drop in further east in England.

They'll be off to Russia again soon. Hopefully they'll be back next winter!

In other news, a small group of us froze our butts off at Topsham Rec. on Saturday evening to do our annual gull count. Birds dropped in from an amazing height, presumably on the back of very clear skies and a tailwind, but numbers were not great. And boooooy was it cold work, standing around like that!

Weekend birding

Off again... Na escaped with the excuse of a party in Cardiff, so I grimly went out and birded for myself instead. Saturday was easy enough: babysitting in the morning, drop Na at the train and head off to a roosting gull survey, where we got chilled to the marrow for the sake of a few thousand Black-headed and Herring Gulls, with a scattering of Common Gull and both black-backed species. Not scintillating, but could have been worse.

Once again the weather forecast was for extreme crap whistling in from the south, so met up with Judith to do some searching of the Exe. Once again, the Met Office were completely up the creek, for which we were quite grateful!

Powderham - the Cattle Egret flock now numbered three birds, with a Little Egret looking down on them amongst the cattle.

Dawlish Warren briefly - all three scoter still present, yes, tick, blah blah.

Starcross - no, no sign of the resident Slavonian Grebe (now beginning to moult into summer plumage again: check the Dawlish Warren website for some piccies). No sign of the Spoonbill either, but pleasant enough birding as it stood - Red-breasted Mergansers and a dusting of waders across the growing mud. No Iceland Gull either. Oh well.

Powderham through to Exminster Marshes - started off well with a good tight pack of Avocet in the river, kleeping and sweeping their way around the ebbing tide; accompanied by Knot, Dunlin and Grey Plover in abundance on the waters' edge. Further up-river, the Brent Geese were peppering the edge of the water, so we stopped off for a scan - five birds in, a nice adult Pale-bellied (hrota) bird; then at the other end of the flock, a Black Brant (nigricans). Seemed good anyhow: wide collar meeting across the front of the neck, whitish flanks and a blacker belly than the accompanying Dark-bellied birds. A couple of minutes later, the whole flock lifted off and dropped onto the shallow floods over the railway line from us. Will have to get back and have another look at that!

We then picked up another little group of Brent on the grass, where we could see legs, so I had a quick squiz through for colour-ringed birds: success in the form of two locally-ringed birds, both from 1996 sessions, and a 'new' bird, which proved to be ringed on the Taimyr peninsula, Russia. Looks like this was the first sighting of it since ringing in 2006 as well, so that was particularly satisfying.

Exminster marshes themselves were covered in Lapwing and Black-tailed Godwit, Teal and Wigeon. We picked out a few Golden Plover amongst the Lapwing, and a Peregrine lurking atop one of the pylons at the back of the site, which seemed to have really put the wind up the Lapwing - they were up and down like, well, fill the blank yourself, I think!

Lapwing flocks over the marshes

I finally dropped Judith back at her car and headed back to search for more colour rings in amongst the godwit, only to be thwarted by the entire flock hoofing it over the horizon as soon as I got back. Consolation in the form of a Ruff and a single Water Pipit, and some quality time watching everything going about it's daily business...

Topsham from Exminster Marshes

Weekend birding - Jan 5th-6th

More Exe-based pottering this weekend, though it doesn't count as patch-based work, as I visit many sites around the river. Saturday morning was spent watching the Lapland Bunting (Longspur, if you prefer) at Orcombe Point, Exmouth. Only the second I've seen in the county, it was lurking in the midst of a reasonably large flock of Skylark - about 150 birds - with a couple of Woodlark and a good smattering of alba wagtails, Linnet, Meadow Pipits and Chaffinch. The birds were fairly flightly, in part due to the attentions of a female Sparrowhawk, which pitched into the flock a couple of times.

Moving on, I managed a quick Slav Grebe at the river mouth, then half a dozen colour-ringed Black-tailed Godwit were found at Bowling Green Marsh - the dowitcher wasn't evident though, as the tide was still rather too low.

Final birding was a repeat visit to Exminster Marshes, where up to 5 Water Pipit were skulking around a couple of ponds on-site. Nice birds, and good to be getting my eye back in on winter birds...

Sunday's birding was pretty much a repeat trip with Judith & her dog, though we failed to see a great deal - the Surf Scoter off the mouth of the Exe and a single Water Pipit being the scarce bird highlight. We did manage to pull 9 colour-marked Brent Geese out of a flock of c.200 birds feeding on Exminster, one of which was ringed on the Taimyr peninsula a few years back. A Green Sandpiper on Bowling Green was also interesting; we don't have too many of them through the winter.

Lapland Bunting Calcarius lapponicus; one I photographed earlier

New Year, new start

Hey ho, another year begins... First off, if anyone reads this, Happy New Year to you - good luck, success and happiness be with you for the coming 360+ days - whatever it may be now.

I managed to load up a few photos from my recent ringing trip to Kenya at http://www.jerbarker.co.uk - make of them what you will! They're only small low-res images at the moment, as I haven't the time to sort out larger images. I might get some uploaded elsewhere sometime; watch this space, I suppose!

The old year ended with a bit of style - the last day of ringable weather produced a record garden catch of 53 birds, including the first Great Spotted Woodpecker (an adult female) I've ringed here.

The last two days were spent walking round a couple of local sites - Yarner Woods on the 30th and Bowling Green Marsh on the 31st. Yarner was its usual semi-productive self, with very little to show for a long walk until the very end, when a superb Lesser Spotted Woodpecker and a cracking male Dartford Warbler gave themselves up in short order. Bowling Green was reasonably good, with the long-staying Long-billed Dowitcher giving reasonable views, and a handful of colour-ringed Black-tailed Godwits. The latter were a mix of new birds and old friends, including one bird ringed in Norfolk in 1996 which I've seen on the Exe most years since 2000!

The beginning of the year continued the good run - a half-day round the Exe producing some 94 species, highlights being Pomarine Skua, Surf and Velvet Scoter, adult Mediterranean Gull and a very smart Water Pipit on Exminster marshes. Not too shabby a way to start the year - particularly now the weather's gone cold and gunky!

WeBS, ringing and birding

An interesting weekend in all... Dog-sitting for a colleague meant I had chance to trot round a fairly unwatched part of Devon in search of some birds for the Atlas - no great excitement, but a handful of typical woodland species including Marsh Tit and Nuthatch, with Redwing much in evidence in the evening.

The afternoon was spent in a largely bird-free Wetland Bird Survey (WeBS) count on the Exe, where the main excitement was finding a nice juvenile Great Northern Diver on the estuary - unfortunately outside our count area. A sprinkling of waders included a very few Black-tailed Godwit, handful of Turnstone and a nice quartet of Greenshank. Best of the wildfowl were about 70 dark-bellied Brent Geese, travellers from the area round the Taimyr peninsula in Russia which winter in quite reasonable numbers on the Exe.

After dropping the dog back at its home, I then hoicked up a substantial amount of netting in the orchard at the end of our road to try and catch some of the thrushes which have been gorging on the windfalls...

Toady (Sunday) saw me up and out by 6.45 to open the nets, in order to leave the site as quiet as possible for the arrival of the thrushes. The first check was just about what I'd hoped for: half a dozen each of Blackbird and Fieldfare, followed up by a rather mixed bag of parids, finches and a Song Thrush - first I've ringed in the village. Now just hoping to get a decent recovery or control from one or more of these wintering birds!

Fieldfare gets it's own back... The unfortunate hands belong to Judith. This was the one adult male we caught; the rest being an adult female, 2 juvenile males, a juvenile female and an unaged female which was probably an adult. Really interesting to see a bird we don't often have chance to catch - lucky to have an orchard that could almost be tailored for ringing!