Sunday 30 November 2008

That place looks perfect for Black Redstart !

I have walked or driven past Seaham Docks many times and thought - it looks great for Black Redstart down there! But I don't go in and look nearly often enough. Today I was doing my atlas square which includes the dock area and guess what I found?







One of the great things about Atlas work is that I end up birding in places I wouldn't normally go!

Sunday 9 November 2008

An autumn update.

It's been a frustrating Autumn! Lots of birds around but I've not found many myself. A Bluethroat on my local patch was the highlight but a calling Greenish Warbler which I couldn't see was the one that got away.

In the meantime I have been to Shetland with an entertaining crew! We missed the big fall by a couple of days.

Between us we found about 30 Yellow-browed Warblers, 1 Bluethroat, 1 Richard's Pipit, 1 Rosefinch, 2 Red-breasted Flycatchers, 2 Barred Warblers, 1 Little Stint, 1 Jack Snipe, 1 acrocephalus sp. (Reed probably!).


Hooded Crow


Herring Gull


Yellow-browed Warbler - a highlight of the trip was seeing two of these in the same tree at two different locations!


Scarlet Rosefinches