Two stunning yanks

And I dont mean Donald Trump and Joe Biden, I am talking about a bufflehead and an American wigeon. Just when you think that the year is meandering to a close and there will not be too many birds to add to lists these two turn up. The bufflehead was a first for Northern Ireland and a fourth for all Ireland and it was spotted on the River Quoile about two weeks ago. Initially it was out in the open but recently it has moved upstream and has to be viewed through a screen of sallow, willow ivy etc.. This makes it hard to get any decent photographs and the nearby Castle Island hide which would give excellent views has beeen locked since March. This link will show you a nice picture the finder took on the day it was discovered out in the open section. http://nibirds.blogspot.com/2020/12/bird-news-saturday-5th-december.html 

 The great and good of Northern Ireland birdwatching were there on Sunday in our own version of a socially distanced mass twitch.

Apparently the bird is still around and will hopefully stay for the winter like the Barrow's goldeneye of legend. It has drifted back to where you can get good views and also drifted upstream where you can get clear views from a long way away!! Nevertheless it is on my life list.

The American wigeon popped up at the river mouth at Glynn with a small flock of wigeon and is indeed showing well. Glynn station has a nice platform, good access and a shelter to sit while you wait for a train. I have been there several times and there is usually something good to look at plus dipper in the Glynn river. This week there were the usual ducks and waders plus the American wigeon and a female goosander. This is not a common bird in Northern Ireland but we do get a few every winter. 

Apart from these exotic visitors things have been fairly slow. WOW opened for two weeks but will be locked down from Christmas Eve until mid February. Hopefully at least one of the hides will stay open. On my volunteering day I had a bright sunny morning and distant birds apart from mallard and teal. I did my usual list and noted that my two previous visits were on March 19th and October 15th. That is three Thursdays in nine months with a six week lockdown into the new year. I'll keep you posted as to how things pan out next week. I had 26 species including the buzzard. The warden cut down the "buzzard tree" as it was a predator perch according to the RSPB! It now sits on the tallest bush just outside the fence secure in the knowledge that the warden cannot cut it down - clever buzzard.

Teal

Distant buzzard on a tree just outside the reserve.

One-legged mallard

Snoozing mallard

Rainbow reflection

There are birds there but they are small and far away Dougal!

No additions to the WOW patch recently but I managed to add redpoll and mute swan to the Bangor West total. The redpoll arrived on the feeder - first in the garden since 2016. The mute swans flew over while we were out for a walk along the coastal path, only the second time I have ever seen them on the patch. Garden birding is interesting as I am trying to do the Birdwatch Ireland garden bird survey. This involves counting the maximum number of species in the garden in a week and then doing this for 13 weeks. First week I had a maximum of 13 goldfinches, next week 7, this week 6. Hardest bit was trying to count coal tits which are everywhere and never sit still. I'll keep you posted in 2021 as with lockdown I may spend more time looking at the garden. I can even compare my spring garden lockdown list with my winter one - how OCD is that?

I have discovered that magpies will eat out of date mince pies, so don't throw them in the bin, leave them on the lawn. Have a safe Christmas and make the best of whatever way it falls. I'll hopefully have a wrap of 2020 at some stage as there isn't much else to do. Before you ask, yes, I am planning to get out birding on New Years Day, for the good of my mental health. Just me in a car with binoculars testing my eyesight!!

2020   

155: Great white egret 

157: Bufflehead Lifer!! 😎

157: American wigeon

NDCP 

72: Lapwing 

73: redpoll 

74: Mute swan

WOW

92: Stonechat

Great white egret

 Finally finally I ticked one of these in Ireland but in Antrim at Ballycarry Bridge not in Down. Having dipped a couple of times in Castle Espie one popped up at Ballycarry Bridge and as they say in birding circles was "showing well". This is usually a prelude to "Disappearing when Derek turns up", but not this time. No need to labour the point enjoy a selection of pictures and if you want really good ones check out the NIbird blog. 

 

 Locally on the patches it has been quiet, cold and wet and walks have suffered accordingly. There have been divers seen off the coastal path but not by me, however I finally saw a flock of lapwing in their old spot so some sanity has been restored to lockdown life. The garden has been overrun with coal tits and they are emptying feeders at a tremendous rate. Kibbled peanuts and sunflower seeds are being buried everywhere as they make multiple trips back and forth. I have seen at least 8 at one time but am sure there are a lot more than that. They have been joined by the regular cast of winter visitors albeit in smaller numbers so far. I think it will need colder weather to pull in more birds. 

A visit to WOW threw up 35 species with all the usual suspects. After one week of opening the observation room closed for 4 weeks and it looks like this will be extended to seven weeks as Northern Ireland locks down on the run up to Christmas. Back of the envelope calculations predict that it might open on Monday 14th so we might get along before the end of the year. In the present way of going nothing is certain so I'll not be taking any bets.  If it does re-open I will try and get a post up to give you some festive cheer. Remember that the light at the end of the tunnel may be a train coming the other way!! Here's a few cheerful pictures from Thursday.

Redpoll on the new feeder

Hard to beat a nice teal

Schnoozing schelduck!!

The swan couple have returned and could well fail to raise chicks again this year

 

2020   

155: Great white egret

NDCP

72: Lapwing

WOW

92: Stonechat

And the nights are drawing in

Not only are the nights drawing in but we are under sort of lockdown again.Fortunately we can get out and about, unfortunately WOW has been forced to close. The hides are still open and we had one glorious week of coffee, heat and toilets, but it was a low tide so there was not a lot to see. Walks along the coasts and local wooded areas have not produced much in the way of birds either. I managed a three mile walk in Clandeboye Wood and the sum total was a singing robin. Even the garden has been on the quiet side with only coal and great tits in any numbers and the feeders have not needed topping up regularly.  I have also attempted to chase a few exotic visitors but that did not work out at all and yellow-browed warbler at Kearney, great white egret at Castle Espie and grey phalarope at Barr Hall Bay all saw me coming and legged it. The birding highlight of the last week or more was three buzzards on Sunday as we went to church. Church is in suburban Bangor West and to see three buzzards over the nearby houses was a bit of a shock, albeit a very nice shock. To be fair Carnalea golf course is just behind these houses and it does have rabbits in abundance so at least there is a rational explanation. I remember having to go to North Antrim in the 1980s to see buzzards and now they are on the local patch. 

I have been to Castle Espie twice to hit the rising tide, the first time we missed it so we had to go back. It's not nice when you look down the path and see water. Well it is nice in its own way but not when you are hoping to see mud and waders. First six photos by my birding pal with the good camera David Miller

What no mud!

Whoops the tide's in

The day was not wasted however as we got to see nature at its smartest. As the tide floods in it pushes through a sluice into the reserve and fills the saltmarsh with water. We noticed a little egret standing on the stones at one side looking intently at the incoming water. It dipped in a couple of times for a small morsel. Swung the binoculars across and there was a kingfisher on the other side doing the same. We watched it dive twice and catch a small fish. On our second visit we had a little egret, redshank, grey heron curlew and greenshank checking out the inflow for a meal. We also managed a smart grey plover and a goldcrest.

Sluice patrol

Distant kingfisher

That's better, mud, waders geese and ducks

50+ great crested grebes with shelduck and eider - very far away!!

Fishing in the creek

Shelduck

Tanya and I did an interesting walk along the northern edge of Strangford Lough from the Flood Gates to the sewage works, an out and back walk of 4 miles. The tide was out but rising slowly and we had good views of the birds of Strangford Lough plus a few species in the hedges and fields. For those of you who do not know this walk it is a raised tidal barrier with Strangford Lough and areas of saltmarsh on one side and Ards Airport and fields on the other side. We had good views of brent geese, shelduck, curlew, redshank, oystercatcher, dunlin, knot, lapwing,  black-tailed godwit and little egret on the Lough and buzzard, kestrel, stonechat, linnet  and skylark over the fields.

Brent on the Lough

Salt marsh

 

 

Dawn record shot from the Flood Gates. This area is good for teal lapwing and pintail.

Tidal barrier

The sign warns of low flying aircraft!!

It is my intention to walk it at high tide as the waders use the fields to roost in while the geese and shelduck float on the water. In summer the lough is virtually empty but the fields and airport support breeding skylark and linnet as well as summer visitors such as swallow and warblers. The airport cafe (Cloud 9) is open to visitors and does scones, coffee lunches etc.. What's not to like about this walk?? The beauty of Strangford and Castle Espie is how quickly the lough changes on a rising tide, these last two pictures were taken about 35 minutes apart.

 

 

 

 

 

2020  

154: White wagtail

NDCP

69: Buzzard

70: Stonechat

71: Pheasant

WOW

90: White wagtail

91: Raven

92: Stonechat

We're WOWing again

After seven months the news is good - WOW has re-opened with all the Covid secure measures in place. Hopefully it can stay open long enough for me to get there and do a bit of warm, caffeine fuelled, toilet accessible and socially distanced birding. Today gave 36 species including two for the patch - raven and stonechat. Other notable ticks were buzzard, little egret, knot, snipe and shelduck. No wigeon or coot. The grass is too long for the former and the latter have gone off for their winter break. This curlew came over to the side nearest the observation room - a rare event indeed. It was good to be back and long may it last.

Curlew

View from the observation room

 Walks along the coast have been enjoyable with autumn kicking in. The garden produced a garden/patch tick in the form of a rather splendid cock pheasant which hung around my garden and the neighbouring garden for over two hours. Fortunately there was no sign of the bird-killing cat. I have also had a baby hedgehog in daylight - about an hour or so before sunset. Not a good sign as it was probably desperate for food. It needs to weigh 600g to survive hibernation and I feel it has a way to go on this front.  We also had superb views of a goldcrest in the fuschia just outside the door - less than a metre away but so active it was a nightmare to get a photo at all never mind a good one. It just kept moving and wing fluttering all the time, so in most shots it was just a blur.

Pheasant

Spot the goldcrest

There it is!!

 2020 

154: White wagtail

NDCP

69: Buzzard

70: Stonechat

71: Pheasant

WOW

90: White wagtail

91: Raven

92: Stonechat

Autumn kicks in

 I wandered lonely as a cloud 

That floats on high o'er vales and hills

When all at once I saw a crowd

A host of golden narrow leaved ragwort.  

At least that is what Wordsworth would have written if he'd lived on Airport Road as opposed to the Lake District. He may even have tried to work the bearded milkcaps into verse two as they were everywhere, a feat I am not even going to think about.

As you can tell there is not a lot to report birdwise over the last few weeks. The lists remain static despite visits to WOW and walks along the coastal path. Winter visitors are drifting in but most of them made the lists before lockdown. It was nice to see sandwich terns and brent geese on the beach at Kinnegar, one preparing to head to West Africa and the other fresh in from Greenland via Iceland. There are still a few late common  terns on the planks at WOW but realistically only Hide 2 is giving any photo opportunities and even this often has rain, condensation, poor light and photobombing reeds and grasses. My attempt with the trail-cam in daylight focused on the feeders has produced over 700 photos of the feeder moving in the wind. To quote my 4 year old grand-daughter re one of her gymnastic moves, "I'm working on it". The place to be is Myroe Levels which has a host of goodies or else one of the sea-watching points such as Ramore Head, Malin Head or Fanad Head. Carnalea and Airport Road are not yet on the must-see places for migrating birds. 

Teal

Shoveler

Common tern adult & chick

Camouflaged curlew

Mute swans, two of four young cobs which turned up.

Late tern chick from October 1st

 

Stop press:  On Tuesday  a coastal walk turned up a couple of stonechats and a female sparrowhawk rock hopping at high tide. For a split second I was thinking kestrel or peregrine, but it turned out to be a sprawk giving lovely views but not a tick!! Anyway lets have a hedgehog video to cheer us all up.

2020

154: White wagtail

NDCP

69: Buzzard

70: Stonechat

WOW

90: White wagtail

WOW with water again

 Starting off with another hedgehog video of the male roaming and feeding. I'm hoping to set the camera up for daylight shots, but don't hold your breath.

WOW seems to be back to normal again as it is full up with water and there isn't a lot of  mud for the waders to feed. There are some common tern chicks at last - I counted 30 plus last week - and also the first two wigeon of the autumn. No shelduck as they are all in Holland, and the mute swans put in an appearance. I hope they find somewhere else to breed as they have been spectacularly unsuccessful at WOW. I also twitched a roseate tern, sanderling and a curlew sandpiper in the aftermath of storm Ellen plus 40+ razorbills off shore at Kinnegar.  The autumn passage is underway and Kinnegar had good numbers of turnstone and ringed plover as well as all the usual suspects. Brent geese mixed with sandwich terns as summer visitors give way to winter visitors. There was a young shag in the channel and a white wagtail among a mixed flock of meadow pipits and pied wagtails.

The highlight of the last couple of weeks was an unexpected little gull on the beach at Donaghadee. I was there with the family for an ice cream from The Cabin, looked over the wall while the grandchildren were in the playground and bingo - little gull kindly sitting beside a black-headed gull for the purposes of comparison. 

The coastal path has thrown up some nice birds as well. A very late swift  for Northern Ireland (September 8th), a buzzard and quite a few razorbills and guillemots dispersing from the breeding areas. Some of them were quite close to shore in Bangor Marina. 

Photos include a migrant wheatear at Ballyhalbert - one of three seen around the harbour area

Common terns

Chicks chilling out

Common tern

Camouflaged curlews

Ballyhalbert wheatear (David Miller)

Kittiwakes in Newcastle-upon-Tyne. I forgot to post this last time. Place was coming down with them. Glad I don't have to powerhose the buildings, lamps and bridges once the breeding season is over.

Lapwings at WOW

2 blackwits and a ruff through dirty angled glass!!

Razorbilll in Bangor marina, one of five with two guillemots.

2020 

151: Curlew sandpiper

152: Roseate tern

153:Little gull

154: White wagtail

Bangor West 

69: Buzzard

Belfast WOW

85: Curlew sandpiper

86: Sanderling

87: Roseate tern

88: Razorbill 

89: Shag 

90: White wagtail