Photographs

Grey phalarope

I have seen a few phalaropes on Farmoor reservoir in Oxfordshire, both Grey and Red Necked all in the autumn, but when one turned up this month I could not resist another visit on the 12th.

Grey Phalarope

This may look as if I am shooting on old black and white film but it is colour, there is just not much colour as the bird is mostly grey and white and the weather was horrible, windy with heavy clouds and a bit of drizzle.

Grey phalarope

I have seen at least 10 of these, here and elsewhere, over the years but I have never seen one come out of the water before, I was watching it for about an hour and during that time it came out of the water 6 times, running out, grabbing some food and running back into the water.

Grey phalarope

The photos do make them look a bit like gulls, but they are tiny about 21 cms long including the bill where as a black headed gull is 36 cms long. and I have never heard of one nicking anyones chips.

Grey phalarope

They do not breed in the UK and are most often seen around the coast in the autumn, but they do sometimes get blown inland, they are usually very tame when they do crop up, often allowing approach within a meter. They habitually swim round and round in tight little circles often close to the edge.

Grey phalarope

They are usually a pleasure to photograph because they are both beautiful and confiding, but this visit the weather spoilt the photos the light was awful, these are the best of a very large number of bad photos I took on the day.

Grey phalarope

On a good day when the sun is out they have eyes and the colours are bright.

Grey phalarope

This one had been around for a few days until I managed to get some time to go and see it so I went on the bad day in case it flew off, but it didn't the next day the weather was a lot better, I should have waited.

Sender billed nutcracker

What a bird, this turned up in Mundersley on the Norfolk coast on Friday 23rd, they are a non migratory Scandinavian bird that errupts every so often and has been cropping up over mainland Europe for a while, it seemed likely one would finally get here, and this one did.

Slender billed nutcracker g

There has not been a twitchable one in England since 1991, it is big, attractive and has a special kind of bird charisma all this added together meant a big twitch, one that we had to join, so we set of on Sunday and arrived on the site about midday.

Slender billed nutcracker

Mundersley is a very nice straggling village with narrow roads and apart from on the sea front no obvious place to park loads of cars, so tension between locals and twitchers was often close to the surface. This was made clear to us as we parked our car in a safe place, a fire engine came past us and then past where the bird was showing with blues and twos going and blasting on its horn.

Slender billed nutcracker

As we made the 5 minute walk to the bird, we met birders coming back who told us it was showing very well, when we arrived we were told the fire engine had just made it fly off, but we were assured it would return, thank goodness it did, after about an hour.

Slender billed nutcracker

The bird was often showing in some large wooded gardens or in a small public field next to the gardens, so birders were waiting around both areas, luckily for us we were waiting on a small wooden bridge and the bird flew into the trees just in front of us, then down onto the grass below, where it showed quite well for a few moments.

Slender Billed Nutcracker

It then flew up into a pine tree, fortunately onto an unobscured bit of bare branch and showed well there long enough to get the shutters clicking, it caused a bit of panic as every one new it was showing in the open but it was not easy to find through binoculars or camera lens in the mass of trees.

Slender billed nutcracker

It then got a bit flighty and flew off among the adjacent house roofs sometimes showing and sometimes not, eventually flying off over the houses. We thought this was a sign of things to come but though it continued to show on and off distantly in the two large gardens we never saw it this well again.

Slender billed nutcracker

From a photo point of view it was a rather odd twitch, a few people got brilliant close up sightings and photos of it that made it look very easy, but I think the majority struggled to get distant shots in bad light, and from cramped vantage points avoiding trees and the other birders. All this aside it was a very special sighting of a very special bird.

Desert Wheatear

We had booked the Cliftonville Hotel in Cromer for a couple of nights, aiming to visit the nutcracker a few times, but after our good watch on the first day and a mediocre watch early on the second morning we decided to go further afield. The parking situation in Mundersly was causing tension with the inhabitants and the people in the houses where the bird was mostly,were showing their displeasure.

Desert Wheatear

Fortunately the Norfolk coast normally has more than one good bird to see, this wheatear had been around a few days, they are lovely birds and we had not seen one for about 10 years which over wintered on the beach in Thursley South Devon so off we went to Cley beach car park where it had been showing very well.

Desert Wheatear

The weather was forcast to turn to rain at lunch time, and it began to spit as we got out of the car, we started to walk the 100 meters along the shingle to where we could see a group of birders obviously watching the bird, the watching group started to break up and walk towards us.

Desert Wheatear

Fortunately for us the bird had flown past us and was between us and the carpark, all we had to do was turn around and watch it on the fencewires and posts less than 20 meters away, unlike the Nutcracker it was moving around all the time but remaining close.

Desert Wheatear

Sometimes it came onto a scrubby patch 3 or 4 meters in front of us, sometimes so close my camera would not focus, it moved around landing in front of most of the other watchers giving them all a turn for good photos.

Desert Wheatear

As this was a completely different type of twitch from the nutcracker, parking was easy, the bird was on public land not someones garden, and there were only 20 or so other birders around, they are very different types of bird, where as the nutcracker comes fron the cold north, Scandinavia; this little bird comes from North Africa and the Middle East.

Desert Wheatear

We constantly hear that getting out with nature is good for your mental health, though twitching is out with nature, I don't think twitches like Mundersley are good for the twitchers mental health, especially if they dip, or for the people who live in the area to be twitched. However watching a pretty wheatear on a wild pebbly beach with plenty of space, certainly is happy and calming.

Desert Wheatear

We met a lovely older lady who lived in Mundersley and told us how she enjoyed the spectacle, but we did see a few men who were clearly anti visitor, one even complaining to everyone who parked quite legally but oposite his house. Though very numerous most twitchers did appear to try to act responsibly but I did see some walk down the drive well into the garden of one of the two regular sighting houses. Good and bad on both sides.