On Tour - Northumberland - Part 2

We called in at a number of reserves on the coast south of Amble on the Tuesday, my favourite reserve though at Hauxley was closed because of major refurbishment works, opening again today (24th) I believe, sad to have missed it, we will have to wait until our next visit to the North East.

So we started at Druridge Pools, (Northumberland Wildlife Trust) visiting both hides and the screen, with the undoubted start being the Spoonbill,

there was plenty of other birds about of course, plenty of Shelduck with ducklings.

 A pair of Swallows had a nest in one one of the hides, we were as quiet and still as possible and they got used to us, not before giving us an angry look from just outside the door though.

 Plenty of Tufted Duck about

 as well as of course Black-headed Gulls,

 and a flock of about 8 Black-tailed Godwit.

 Not many Lapwings, but one patent with a youngster

Also seen at Druridge, Curlew, Teal, Gadwall, Kestrel,Coot, Moorhen, House Martin, Swift, Shoveler, Canada & Greylag Geese, Great Crested Grebe, Redshank and Mute Swan.

From Druridge we drove the 5 minutes down to Cresswell Pond, again NWT, the start here were 5 Little Gulls resting up on the scrape,

and a couple of Tree Sparrows sunning themselves,

There were a few Avocets along with chicks, but mainly right over the other side of the Pond, not good for a any photography. One little start was a male Reed Bunting singing his head off to the right of the hide,

there were a couple of females about, but they weren't interested.

In addition at Creswell; Shelduck, Tufted Duck, Cormorant, Little Egret, Oystercatcher, Lapwing, Redshank, Sedge Warbler, plus the Hirudines, Corvids and Gulls.
We stayed a while before driving to the Ice-cream shop in Cresswell Village, purchasing said Ice-creams and sitting on a bench overlooking the sea, just in case any dolphins passed by. (Happened to us a few years ago!) But not this time.

Time to head north again, this time stopping at East Chevington (NWT) for Marsh Harriers and aq late afternoon cup of tea. No sooner had we made the tea when,

a male Marsh Harrier came through bringing something back to the nest, a great end to a quiality days birding!

On Tour - Northumberland - Part 1

We have recently returned from a week in Northumberland, staying in Seahouses as it's handy for the boats to the Farne Islands. I know this sounds mad but we went to Seahouses via Edinburgh from the West Midlands, but all will be revealed!

Our daughter lived in Edinburgh and her partner was away on business for a couple of weeks, so we went a day early stayed over and took her with us a good plan where much alcohol was consumed and a good time had by all, before we took her up to Berwick on the Sunday to get the train back.

We didn't want to burden Jen with birding, but we did do a walk from Craster to Dunstanburgh with her and picked up a few feathered friends along the way, the biggest surprise was what at first I thought was a Sparrowhawk flying near us, turned out to be a Cuckoo, wasn't quick enough to get the camera on it though.

Birding highlights of the walk, Shelduck,

 Fulmar,

 Kestrel,

 Kittiwakes,

 and Razirbills.

In addition, Skylark, Linnet, Shag, Kittiwake, Starling and Swallows were seen.

After a great evening on the Saturday at a particularly good seafood restaurant in Bamburgh we took Jen to the station on the Sunday, then paid a visit to St Abbs Head, back over the border in Scotland. A lovely walk with a surprise as we set out....

 Great views,

 plus plenty of Guillemots and Razorbills.

Upton Warren early June

Due to a trip to Scotland and Northumberland and a lot of other things going on, I haven't had chance to do a post about a visit we made to Upton Warren NR back on the 3rd. So as my memory isn't what it was, I will keep it brief and just post a few pics, the primary goal was to see the Avocet chicks as we know that we probably won't get many chances to get to Upton before they are all grown up, but we start with some Canada Geese,

 Now the Avocets,

 some youngsters are almost fully grown,

 but there is still some squabbling among the adults,

 a few Lapwing showed well,

 as did the Little Ringed Plovers

 as did the one LRP chick (although sad to say from reserve reports I don't think it made it)

A very young Avocet,

Jackdaw,

 Little Grebe,

 and a Willow Warbler

A loveley afternoon as usual.

Looking Up in Trafalgar Square

After a busy afternoon of theatre going and even a museum visit, we found ourselves in Trafalgar Square, where we spotted a Peregrine Falcon zoom into the square and disappear into a recess at the top of Nelson's Column. We parked ourselves for a while on a nice bench in the sun with a good view of the top of the column but the Peregrine didn't come out again while we were there. So we assume that it is nesting up there, a good spot on a cultural day out, quickly followed by a fly through of a Ring-necked Parakeet, I know they are now quite common in London, but a first for the year none the less.

No photos with this post as my camera was safely tucked away in B64!

Zakynthos

We have recently come back from a weeks family holiday on Zakynthos (Zante), this definitely was not a birding holiday, plenty of sun, sea, food and the odd alcoholic beverage!!

We stayed pretty close to our villa near Beloussi with walks down to the beach side tavernas, so the only birds were what we saw as we mooched about. These were predominantly Swallows, House Sparrow, Goldfinch, Greenfinch and Collared Dove, with the odd House Martin and Swift making an appearance.

The swallows though were a delight, skimming our pool and perching in our veranda.

Tina and myself had a sight seeing drive around the island on the Thursday and we bumped into this little chap,

followed by a Woodchat Shrike a bit later on.
A few Yellow-legged Gulls were seen and while we were driving a Honey Buzzard flew by but we couldn't stop to get a better view.

On our last day this chap paid a visit to the villa,

Worcestershire Nightingale (Croome Park)

A day out yesterday saw us at the National Trust Croome Park with then intention of going for a longish walk, it was a lovely day and much warmer than we though it would be.
As you would expect at this time of the year the Swallows and House Martins were very busy. These were our first House Martins of the year and it was great to see them swooping around and going up into their nests on Croome Court.

I didn't mange to get a pic of the House Martins, but a Swallow did oblige,

As we walked along the 'River' (I've put this in inverted commas, as it's not a real river)

we saw our first Goslings of the Spring, both Greylag and Canadas,

We did see some Reed Buntings as we progressed on our walk, along with Mute Swan, Grey Heron, Coot, Jackdaw, Crow, Buzzard and Kestrel.

We stopped for as usual a late lunch at the end of the river, where not much else was seen but plenty heard, apart from a flyover by a Great Spotted Woodpecker.

We continued our walk through a wooded path, when in a clearer area we heard Nightingales, there were at least two and were really close, but we just couldn't see them, we spent a while there listening, it was awesome. It would have been nice to see them but in this case hearing is just as good.
This was our first encounter with Nightingales in the UK, the only other place being Lesvos (So far!)

Scotland Again - Cape Wrath and Bits and Pieces

This is the last post for this Scottish trip, but it won't be the last for Scotland this year as there is at least one more more wildlife based trip planned this year.
So on our 'Windy' Thursday explorations we added, Redshank and Greenshank to our list of birds,

 Stonechats were everywhere,

 and we came across Pink-footed Geese on a surprising number of occasions

 and another great sighting of Black-throated Diver was had.

 On the Friday the wind had dropped so after checking with John the Ferryman we drove north again and went for the ferry at 10:30. The 'ferry' only takes four people at a time and there were 15 of us, plus the mini-bus driver. While we were waiting we saw our first Sandwich Terns of the year, I didn't expect to see a Sandwich tern until we visit the Farnes in June.

 A Rock Pipit obliged us as well while we waited for John to row out and get the slightly larger boat,

 The crossing.....

Once all of us were assembled and after adding a Willow Warbler to the list, we boarded the bus for the 1 hour, 11 mile journey to Cape Wrath, where upon the weather decided to stop being nice and it rained the whole way and with 16 people in a bus the windows steamed up fairly quickly, but we did see some Red Deer and then some Whoopers in a small loch. Others on the bus saw some Red Grouse, but neither of us saw them. We eventually made it to the most North Westerly point of the UK and the rain stopped, hurrah! So we pose for a photo, where the next stop behind us would be Canada!

 Up on the point we saw thousands of Pink-foots heading to Greenland for the Summer, plus a few Redwing, Meadow Pipit, Fulmar, distant Gannet, Razorbill and Guillemot

 After an hour it was all back on the bus and the return journey, then as if on cue the rain started again! Only allowing a murky scenery shot along route,

Once back we drove up to Durness for a late lunch and a visit to Smoo Cave and waterfall.

 Then as the weather was now not very nice, wet and cold, we visited Cocoa Mountain, a brilliant chocolate shop at Balnakiel and had the best Hot Chocolate ever!!

We paid one last visit to the harbour at Kinlochbervie before going back to pack, the reward this time being another Red-throated Diver (in the rain of course!!)

 So finally on the way back home via Edinburgh, we stopped to see our faithful pair of Osprey, at first the nest looked deserted, but after a few minutes we weren't disappointed and we had about 10 minutes of decent views, a great birding end to a week in Scotland