A quick morning circuit

The opposite to yesterday, the rain held off till lunchtime, then never really stopped. Even in the morning it was overcast and gloomy. A SE wind.

Just my stuff so far Malcolm

Red Nab 08:30 - it was barely light!

Pale-Bellied Brent goose 38 seen, there could easily have been others

Pale-bellied Brent geese

Shelduck 2

Wigeon 180 minimum

Little Egret 1

Grey Heron 1

Rock Pipit 1

Imperial Rd

No sign of the Stonechats 

Water Rail at least 2 squealing

Common Snipe 1

Kestrel 1

Middleton Nature Reserve main pond

Mute, Mallards, Coot and Moorhen as recent. No sign of Little Grebes

Tufted Duck 18

Gadwall 10

Near Naze and Heliport 

I called in on my way home 09:50

There were c1,600 Knot circling and shaping to land on the Near Naze rocks. Then the almost inevitable Peregrine arrived. The Peregrine goes through this flock near the top from left to right early in this clip. Presumably a successful attack, but the flock still left to the south.

Redshank and Oystercatcher on the heliport wall

Shag 2 juveniles, both arrived from the north

This was the first to arrive, it flew past the Naze and landed on the sea to the south.

By this time it was 10:00 and the Power Station was conducting its weekly test of the alarms. You might want to turn the volume down!

The second one arrived a couple of minutes later and landed directly on the rocks.

At least 4 foxes caught by my head torch near the Moss this evening - Janet

A bonus break in the rain

It rained all morning but was reduced to light showers for a while after lunch. A fresh SE wind.

Near Naze (Malcolm) 10:15

A juvenile Shag was fishing around the Near Naze rocks. Unfortunately, it had finished feeding, or trying to feed, by the time I got my camera ready.

It then flew off towards Heysham Head

Heysham skear (Malcolm) 12:45 - 14:00

I wasn't expecting to get out here today. There were a couple of showers before the more persistent rain returned. The light was poor and the wind buffeting, but it was still good to get out!

Pale Bellied Brent goose 29 flew north

Brent geese heading north

No Eider, Mergansers or grebes.

Shag 1 juvenile, possibly the same as this morning's bird.

Juvenile Shag

There were 1500 Knot, but for the most part hunkered down in terrain I think of as "boulder fields", only small stones in reality, but enough to obscure most legs.

Almost impossible seeing any flagged birds when they rest here

Fortunately some did venture out to feed and I managed to read a few flags, 
but all seen here previously this winter. This is a Norwegian flagged bird.

An oasis of nice weather in an otherwise wet week.

A dry and sunny day with virtually no wind........it won't last!

Imperial Rd (Malcolm) 09:30

Water Rail at least three calling.

Teal 1

Little Egret 1

Little Egret

Long-Tailed Tit 14 at least passed through

Long-Tailed Tit

Stonechat 2 - the female was busy feeding, but the male seemed to be enjoying soaking up the morning sun.

Male Stonechat. The drops of water are from the morning mist condensing.
 My glasses were almost constantly steamed up!

Kestrel 1

Kestrel

Heysham skear (Malcolm) 11:45 - 14:00

Pale-bellied Brent goose at least 26. Small groups (3 - 7) were flying in both directions.

Pale-bellied Brent geese

Eider 26

A line of Eider on a mirror sea

Great Crested Grebe 6

Little Egret 4

Oystercatcher 1,500

Curlew 20

Redshank 80

Grey Plover 1

Knot 2,000

Turnstone 40

Grey Plover, Knot and Oystercatcher 

I was joined today by Isla Botting who is one of the team that flags Knot in the Wadden Sea, Netherlands. There were c1,300 Knot resting while the feeding areas on the skear became exposed. We positioned ourselves on the southern edge of the skear, hoping the Knot would feed on the relatively level areas there. But they moved to the north side and were joined by another 700 arriving from the south. 

We did see several flagged birds from three schemes, including one from the Wadden Sea.

This shot by Isla is one of the Wadden Sea Knot. 

This shot, also by Isla includes a knot still in semi summer plumage

Knot landing along the Northern edge of the skear

The reason why they chose the north side today, is that at this time of year huge quantities of tiny shrimps can be in the shallows. 

These Knot are after tiny shrimps

But for the moment they are out of luck! There will be some shrimps around, but the drain that normally passes along the north side has been diverted by the last storm. I had my small net with me today, and when these Knot moved on I tried in vain to catch a shrimp here.

A line of shrimping Black-Headed gulls 200m north of the skear showed
where the drain now empties into the sea.

I walked over to the drain and did a 5 second trawl with my small net

Brown Shrimps, still only tiny but a huge total weight of potential protein.

It had been a lovely afternoon, and up till this point no disturbance by Peregrines. But one arrived and all the Knot headed south. Interestingly, the Peregrine didn't follow them, instead it stayed and tried to catch one of the shrimping Redshank. Possibly they turned to Redshank in the Knot's recent absence. Or probably more likely, the Peregrines are aware that it is harder for the Redshank to quickly take flight when they are up to their bellies in water.

Dismal!

It rained all day, not as heavily as yesterday, but dismal is probably an understatement, it never really seemed to get light! Almost no wind.

Heysham skear (Malcolm) 

I just had a quick look as the tide was exposing the skear.

Red-breasted Merganser 13

Male Red-breasted Merganser

They were mainly males, displaying to impress a female - she didn't look overly impressed!

Eider 34

Eider

Some of the male Eider were also displaying. The three birds that fly past at the end of the clip are more Mergansers arriving 

Little Egret 1

It was quite early in the tide and the waders were just arriving 

Oystercatcher 800

Curlew 10

Redshank 120

Knot 1,000

Turnstone 40

Some of the Redshank arriving 

Imperial Rd (Malcolm)

Buzzard 1 calling but not seen. It must have been on the far side of the copse.

Water Rail at least 3 calling

No sign of the Stonechats, they seem to have a different feeding area when it rains.

Not exactly wildlife, but this horse was doing what comes naturally.......

........having a roll in the wet grass.

Things are looking brighter for tomorrow, but only for the one day!

Not much, and what there was, was wet!

Constant morning rain eased to prolonged showers by the afternoon. A south wind.

Middleton Nature Reserve (Malcolm)

I only managed a quick check of the main pond at the height of the morning rain!

I female Mute Swan still with six well grown young

Mallard 35

Tufted Duck 16

Gadwall 6

Coot 12

Moorhen 4

Little Grebe 2

Tufted Ducks and a Little Grebe

Tufted Duck and two Little Grebes

Tufted Ducks a Gadwall and a Little Grebe

Fortunately a male Great Spotted Woodpecker provided a splash of colour

Great Spotted Woodpecker 

Some flagged Knot information 

This bird on the skear earlier this month was coded at the Wadden sea in
the Netherlands last November. The code is R3YPYY. 
R3 is the flag colour (red) and its position. The other letters are the colour of
its rings: yellow, pale blue, yellow, yellow

A few of this scheme's birds are also radio tagged. The tags are tiny and light and are shed with its feathers during moulting. This is a summary of one tagged this autumn that was tracked to our area.

R3PYPN, tag 3916. Was in the Wash before moving to Spurn Nature Reserve. Was consistently detected at Spurn until the 9th of November, when it flew to Morecambe Bay and was detected on the Walney receiver. It has received low level detections since, which means it may be on the Heysham side of Morecambe Bay.

One to watch out for.  The flag is the same as the above shot and the rings are: pale blue, yellow, pale blue, black. All you would see of the tag is a fine wire beyond its tail that transmits the data.

Last of the sunshine for a while?

A dry day, probably the last for a while! The fresh south wind was biting.

North shore

Pale-bellied Brent goose 54 out from the play area - David Kaye

I checked the skear (Malcolm) 09:00 - 10:30

Pink-Footed goose a lone bird flew south

Pink-Footed goose

As I was walking out the Peregrines were causing havoc with the waders which in turn lifted the Brent geese, 12 ended up around the edges of the skear.

Three Brent geese

Four Brent geese headed off to the north

Eider 6

Four Eider arriving from the north

Red-breasted Merganser 5 together on the sea. The sea was quite choppy and they seldom all showed at once, so I took this short clip.

Shag 2 - one was only seen in flight, but the one seen resting on a rock was more mature than the juveniles that have been around.

Shag

Two of several Cormorants 

Little Egret 2

Oystercatcher 1,000 (the tide hadn't gone out far before I had to leave, likely more arrived later)

Curlew 6

Black-Tailed Godwit 3

Redshank 50 (more along waterline further south)

Knot 2,000 returned when the Peregrines left. A few flagged birds seen

Turnstone 40

Dunlin 15

Black-Tailed Godwit and Knot

I returned this afternoon as the tide was covering the skear again. 1,000 Knot were resting, but a Peregrine attacked cleared them all before I could check them.

Pale-bellied Brent geese flying from the north. Plus a Curlew 

The forecast isn't looking good for the week ahead.