June and July- The Wyre Forest

My last June and July roundup mostly covered some of the avian delights I had seen at Upton Warren, but away from that I spent a long time down in the Wyre forest, looking for and photographing butterflies, but also keeping an eye and an ear out for any passing birds.

By far the rarest thing that I found was a stunning Dark-Green Fritilary, which despite originally identifying it as a female Silver washed, that later changed that evening, and it turned out that this species had gone practically extinct in the Wyre  a number of years ago, and my sighting was followed by a few more, which is great news.

Luckily, I had my Canon DSLR with me, and I was able to get up close and personal to a number of Fritilaries, including this stunningly fresh specimen which repeatedly returned and fed off a  thistle in one of the many flower meadows in the forest.

I also managed to find a Marbled White, which perched really nicely on ferns adjacent to one of the tracks. Although a fairly common butterfly, these still remain up there on my 'favorites' list.

The number of Silver-washed Fritilaries was superb, and they could literally be found throughout the forest. As is in their nature though, they were more content gliding around up in the treetops and tantalisingly dropping down low over the ground to flit around you before flying back up to the canopy.

Needless to say, this proved fairly aggravating, but eventually, a rather dapper female dropped down and perched really well and proceeded to show very nicely, sadly lacking the males gorgeous markings, but rather nice in itself.

Also showing off its silvery green underwing.

A few males chose to perch up distantly though, and I managed a few Digi-binned shots as they perched on nettles, which I'm sure got a  few 'phwarr' notes from me, Look at that!

Red admirals were common throughout the forest, and I eventually managed to track down a very photogenic black and red gem as it perched and warmed up in the sun.

The White Admirals were less than showy unfortunately, and tended to only perch up briefly once I had found them. One did perch up on trackside vegetation, but it was rather tatty, with large chunks taken out of the wings and bright sunshine glowing off its upperwing.

A few very stunning freshly emerged Comma's were also showing, with one choosing to warm up on my bad which proved a nice radiator for it!

I also managed much that I saw but didn't managed to photograph, such as Small Pearl-boardered Fritilaries and most Common butterflies. Dragonflys were represented by Four spotted Chasers, a single Golden-ringed Dragonfly as the highlights, with most of the common 'Dragons' of the forest also seen.

MB

HANG ON!

You didn't think i was going to do a post without mentioning birds right!!

Despite most birds been fairly quiet at this time of year, i still managed to 'connect' with all the forest specialities, such a Pied Flycatcher, and a large family party of Spotted Flycatchers. Tree Pipits also made an appearance, and i finally managed to connect with a Redstart, with a male showing in the vicinity of Lodge Hill Orchard. A number of Dippers were located, including a few juveniles, which were great to watch. A Lesser Spotted Woodpecker was a nice surprise as it called loudly while I was watching White Admirals!

All in all a very enjoyable way to spend a number of days!

MB

Summer in the Wyre Forest! Woodland birds and butterflies

18/05/14

The Wyre forest in spring is one of my favourite birding destinations. Despite the hoards of ramblers, 'extreme' cyclists and marauding dogs, I always find that a walk in the Wyre is a great way to 'get away' from everything, just looking for birds and butterflies.

Today was no exception, and I went in hopeful to snag the entire plethora of our regular summer migrants.

First on the list, although I had seen two already was a singing male SPOTTED FLYCATCHER, already a good start, as a few years ago I truthfully struggled to find any throughout the summer. Luckily, the last couple of years has been more productive for them, and they seem to have also had much better breeding success! I found another singing male in another area of the Wyre also.

 

As always, WOOD WARBLERS were easy to pick up, with their very distinctive, and rather appealing 'spinning coin' song, and this could be heard almost constantly throughout the walk! Although many remained as 'heard only' I did eventually track down a few birds, including a pair which gave stunning views, showing off the rather beautiful mix of moss greens, bright yellows and dazzling whites on their plumage!

A total of 4 Tree Pipits were singing at various points in our circular walk, including a few which were showing nicely and parachuting from the tops of tree. Weirdly, one of the located singing birds was well away from one of the usual areas, and rather than being in a clearing as usual, had instead chosen to hold territory in the middle of a deep woodland, below the forest canopy, obviously resulting in an inability to 'parachute' display flight, rather choosing to sing from a perch.

 

 

 

As the more acutely trained of you may hear in the previous video, there was also a stunning male PIED FLYCATCER singing close to where the Pipit was, which was actively defending a nest box adjacent to the track. 

 

 

In previous years I have seen male Pied Flycatchers with small amounts of grey on the back and upperwings, however this bird really was a very extreme 'grey' bird, which at times resembled a Shrike from behind! I can't say that I have ever seen a Pied Fly like this before!

 

(Sorry about the Dog panting all over the camera in this video, as previously stated, the number of marauding dogs was extremely high on this fine summers day!)

 

 

I managed to find 3 male Pied Flys, and reports from others seem to suggest they have had a much greater presence in the forest this year, which is great news, as for the last few years, numbers have been dwindling!

 

A single juvenile DIPPER, in fact my first of the year, was located along the brook, and a pair of Mandarin did their best to try to avoid being detected!

 

As well as its birdlife, the Wyre is famed for it's Butterflies, but being fairly early in the season, other than decent numbers of Pearl-Bordered Fritilary it was rather quiet!

 

 

All in all a very successful visit, and one that would be repeated throughout the summer!

MB

The first 'official' NGB meetup- Spurn 2014

3/04/13

The first weekend in May was the proposed data for the first meetup on the Next Generation Birders, a 350 strong member group (and growing) of young birders, each of which have a common interest. birds and wildlife.

Luckily, I hooked up with local birder James from Shropshire, Justin from Carmarthenshire and Sam from Nottinghamshire, and these became my companions for most of the weekend.

As I'm sure many can guess, Spurn was chosen because of it very enviable track record when it comes to migrants, and despite being a little 'early' in the spring for passage at Spurn I remained hopeful, I was going to see birds I don't usually see in my Worcester homeland anyhow.

After a fairly uncomfortable and cold night camping, I was awoken very early on before the first few sheds of light started to appear to the sound of a Cuckoo'ing Cuckoo, my first of the year, and with the sound of 'Klupping' Avocets and piping Oystercatchers, I took that as my alarm to wake up! A couple of other NGB's, Dan and Sam, had took that as their wake up call also, so we decided to walk to the Beacon Pools via Kilnsea wetlands in the early morning gloom. We had barely got past the last house on the road before ahead of us we spotted a silhouetted SHORT-EARED OWL quartering the long grass and rape fields around us. It flew off fairly quickly though, and flew off towards Beacon lane.

Nearing the Wetlands hide, a stunning male Whinchat perched up on the adjacent rape field, giving stunning views, even despite their still being almost no light.

The pools were quiet, but we kept finding decent birds, a Marsh Harrier flew over, Lesser Whitethroats were singing everywhere and both 'Flava' and 'Alba' Wagtails were piling over in numbers.

One of the outstanding highlights of the trip on the first day however, the great numbers of both Bar-tailed Godwit and Whimbrel on the move, with decent numbers of both moving through the wetlands throughout the day, among these migrating wader flocks were smaller numbers of Curlew and a partially summer plumaged SPOTTED REDSHANK dropped onto the Kilnsea wetlands over high tide with a decent flock of Barwit and Whimbrel.

 

 

 

 

Throughout the day more birds dropped in, a Common Scoter and 4 Red-breasted Merganser dropped onto the Beacon pools in the afternoon, and the male Whinchat from the morning found a 2nd bird.

 

 

 

 

 

 A female Redstart was found, and that was duly located and seen, as was good numbers of Wheatear along the road between Kilnsea and the Warren.

 

 

High tide here was full of activity, with a large wader and Brent Goose flock showing on the adjacent Humber mudflats. Among the numerous Dunlin and Grey Plover were smaller numbers of Ringed Plover, Sanderling, Turnstone and a single Knot, most of which were in stunning summer plumage!

Terns were constantly moving around along the sea, and throughout the day 30+ Little Tern and 4 Arctic Tern were seen.

The rarest bird of the weekend was found in the afternoon, but was sadly not at Spurn, but a few miles up the road. However, despite the short time they saw it we decided to drive over there, we couldn't find it, but a lucky piece of mis-direction led us to find a stunningly plumaged male Pied Flycatcher.

We refound the location where the Wryneck had been, and instead head another Cuckoo and found a singing male Tree Sparrow, a fairly rare bird in my home county so I was very happy!

 

We returned to Spurn and saw the Spotted Flycatcher that had been found, which had drew quite a crowd!

 

 

 

For the sake of completeness, I walked out onto the point in the hope of relocating the Black Redstart seen earlier in the day. This drew a blank and food started to take over our minds, so we hotfooted it back to the Joly Sailers for food and drinks with the other 20 NGB's, via a very showy male Kestrel.

 

 

 

 As you can see, a full days birding left some very tired NGB'S strewn about on the raised track between Kilnsea Wetlands and the Beacon Pools.

 

 

 

4/05/14

As you can imagine, having had a good reward from getting up early the previous day, I chose to repeat that. A much better nights sleep left me feeling in a better mood, and I head out to find some birds! The wetlands held a flock of 4 Pintail, and the Pools had 2 Shoveler, a Common Sandpiper, and the female Common Scoter from the previous day remained. A number of Little Tern were feeding in the pools, giving stunning views from the raised track. A single Snipe was showing in fields adjacent to the road

 

 

 

Yellow Wagtails were moving en mass throughout the day, even from very early in the morning, and it is possibly the first time I have ever said "Just another Yellow Wagtail". 2 Marsh Harrier passed through during the day, one even hunting in the field, as view from our tent! A Greenshank flew in off the sea mid-afternoon. Migration in action!

 

 

While walking up the beach side of the Beacon Pools, I met up with Sam again, and we walked up Beacon Lane, and soon after, we were treated to great views of a male Lesser Whitethroat, and then a male RING OUZEL started 'chacking' in the hawthorns next to us, showing briefly in the grounds of the caravan site and in flight!

 

There really did seem to be Lesser Whitethroat everywhere, and while watching ANOTHER 2 near the Bluebell, a Tree Pipit flew low over our heads calling.

Just up the road, a late BRAMBLING was showing around the grounds of Kew gardens.

 

Down at the Warren, a repeat of yesterdays wader flocks was again a great sight, and it was spent scanning with Martin Garner of Birding Frontiers fame. The large Dark-belled Brent Goose flock had been joined by two Pale Bellied Brents (One shown in photo).

 

 

Wader numbers were higher than the previous day, and we enjoyed larger numbers of almost the full range of Arctic breeding waders in summer plumage. With news having emerged of a couple of migrant passerines out on the point, we dragged ourselves on the long walk across the sand out to the concrete track. The recent storm tides of winter 2013/14 had washed a significant part of the road out, making access difficult.

 

We managed to locate a male Redstart, and after texting Justin (who was already on the point) he came to have a look. While waiting for the bird to re-appear, we heard a 'Crest' calling from an area behind us, and immediately knew this was the FIRECREST we had been wanting to re-locate. Eventually, we all had great views as it came to the edge of its favoured bushes a few times.

 

With time now coming to a close on the NGB trip, we made our way back to the Warren, where we were told we had just missed a flypast Spoonbill, but a hunting Short-eared Owl gave us some compensation as we rested before starting our journey.

 

 

Despite no real rarities, (being from a midland county) I had a great time seeing decent numbers of passage migrants, and certainly saw more than I would in my home counties.

 

Thanks to James G for driving, and for providing the tent, I would have been a little stuck if it wasn't for you! Also, thanks to all NGB's that turned up, for the banter, and for sharing news on birds that were being found, it certainly made a great break to endless revision!

 

MB

Dotterel, Partridges, Grouse, Flycatcatchers and a bit of Med.

18/04/14

It was late on the evening of 13th that news emerged that a large flock of some stunning passage waders had dropped onto a regular stop-off on the Long Mynd, and sensing my angst to get up there, Liz, Rob and Luke came to my rescue, and within an hour, plans were arranged for a dawn journey up onto the stunning Shropshire hills.

 

Unfortunately, I usually miss Dotterel passage, but this year the birds arrived on a day I was able to drop everything.

 

Following a bit of driving around, we soon located a suitable looking field up on one of the peaks of the Mynd, just down the road from Pole cottage, and even from a distance, a couple of birders could be seen.

 

We were soon informed that the entire flock of DOTTEREL were still present! All 12 of them!

 

Even though the light was poor, we had amazing views of the birds as they trotted around the sheep grazing field. Of the flock, 8 were males/ winter plumaged birds, but the remaining 4 were all stunning summer plumaged females, truly stunning birds,

 the mixture of slate grey contrasting strongly to that vivid orange belly and bright white face and breast markings!

 

 

 

Soon however, the sun started to come out, and the light improved, showing just how stunningly beautiful these high plateau breeding waders are!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Even from early on, it was clear the birds had migration on the mind, being very flighty, taking off and circling, sometimes up to a great height, calling , but always eventually dropping down, often giving binocular filling views as they flew past the ever growing crowd.

 

 

 

While watching the Dotterel flock, a few raspy clucking calls from behind us in the heather gave us prior warning to a short fly past of a pair of RED GROUSE before they dropped back down into the undergrowth, and no doubt then going off scuttling away along the ridge.

 With the crowd now growing  rapidly, we moved on to another site in the hills, where we managed to find a nice and early male PIED FLYCATCHER, singing his heart out from adjacent to his chosen patch of trees.

 

 

 

In the distance, a spiral of soaring Raptors guided us onto a loose 'flock' of 4 Red Kite, 2 Raven and 8 Buzzard, not at all a bad combination!

 

Our last check of the Shropshire hills led us onto the Stiperstones, where we managed to 'connect' with even more summer migrants, with both Tree Pipit and Redstart singing. The heather held a few Stonechats, and 2 Red Grouse gave stunning views as they flew past us and over the ridge and the adjacent valley proved superb hunting grounds for another 2 Red Kites.

 

Moving onwards again, we moved to Venus Pool, where a long staying Mediterrenean Gull was showing on the water, a rather poorly marked 1st winter bird, but it gave good views in both flight and on the water. A single Little ringed Plover was scuttling around one of the islands and a late male Pochard was on the water.

 

 

With the pool being generally quiet however, we decided to walk around, down to the river and back. In doing so, a male Yellow Wagtail flew over our head calling.

 

On our walk around some nearby fields, a pair of GREY PARTRIDGE flushed out of the set aside ahead of us, before flying off and landing on the set aside on the opposite side of the field. It was great to see this species in particular, as it is one I do not regularly see at all!

 

As it was on the way back, it would have been rude to not drop into Chelmarsh, and we were rewarded with a singing Lesser Whitethroat, which was showing in the hedge adjacent to the parked car. 2 Whitethroat were also showing here which added to the passerine interest of the day. The reservoir had low water levels, and 4 Common Sandpipers were wading the edges. A surprise female Goosander was also roosting on the water.

 

 

Following on from a great days birding, we split our ways, but we were all reunited as soon as a few hours later, when we turned up to Upton Warren to try to see the reported Savi's warbler.

 

A couple of hours later, a few singing Sedge, Reed and a single reeling Grasshopper Warbler was all we had to show, but the banter was brilliant and ended a great day perfectly.

 

MB

Summer Birding!

19/05/13

(Note- I just spent the last hour on a detailed and intricate post for these days, but a simple slip of the finger and the whole of the post was deleted, so at the moment i am in no mood to be repeating it, so this post will be little more than the bare basics)

Wyre Forest

SPOTTED FLYCATCHER was one of the hardest birds for me to find last year, so i was incredibly happy to find two birds down by the brook, singing and calling constantly.

9 WOOD WARBLERS were found in numerous location around the Wyre, including 7 singing birds.

Redstarts were also well represented, as 5 were located, including a couple showing well!

My main reason for visiting however was to find a stunning butterfly! 

PEARL-BORDERED FRITILLARY

I found at least 10 of these stunning butterflys along a short section of grassy verge along the railway line.

19/05/13

A patch visit was rewarded with 10 Reed Warbler, a Reed Bunting and a breeding pair of Grey Wagtails.

22/05/13

The male PIED FLYCATCHER was still showing in the undisclosed site, but again, has failed to attract a mate, poor sod, A Cuckoo was singing nearby.

23/05/13

I found a Red-legged Partridge at Sheepwash which was incredibly unexpected. Completely surrounded by Urban sprawl, it is the most unlikely of locations to find one, but this obvious migrant bird spent the afternoon on the mound, disappearing overnight.

MB

Birding in my 'secret' woodland spot.

1/05/13

Ahh, the first day of may, and a nice day it was too! So an afternoon visit to my 'secret site' following my lesson was in order. Following the usual route i walked past the Tawney Tree, to find that as usual, he was perched up on top, giving nice views in the sunshine. Moving on, i quickly found my first Lesser Whitethroat of the year on the hill tops, getting brief views of it as it moved along the gorse. Dropping back down to the LSW area i then spent the next 2 hours stood in one spot as the LesserPecker was calling, but refusing to show. A brief bout of drumming confirmed that the bird was the male, and after a considerable amount of time, i got a brief flight view as it flew from the dense trees to the other area of dense trees on the opposite side of the track.

The male Pied Flycatcher was still singing in his spot, and showing nicely!

2/05/13

Visiting the woodland again failed to produce any new birds, however, had stunning views of the Pied Flycatcher, much less mobile than usual!

MB

Highlights from late April

20/04/13
Patch
A early morning stomp around the patch was rewarded in the form of stunning views of the pair of Mandarin Duck (The long staying pair) which were feeding in paddocks on the riverbank. At least 2 Willow Warbler were singing, as were 4 Skylark. 2 Lapwing continued to show. A few Starlings were also showing very well in the sunlight.

Later that same day, i received news that the male Ring Ouzel was still showing near the lakes at Earlswood, and being just down the road, i't be a shame not to drop in. So once i had finished my jobs for the day i decided to have a short walk down the road, across the Causeway, down the side of Windmill pool to the paddock along the Gypsy lane, to be greeted almost instantly with a view of a stunning male RING OUZEL. couple of birders appeared, and i had a quick look though one of their scopes (Thankyou) and get a couple of pictures.

A stunning adult male, a jet black bird, with possibly the largest white blaze you can get slapped on the front! Stunning!

24/04/13

A trip into my 'Undisclosed' woodland was incredibly rewarding. A male PIED FLYCATCHER was singing in the same spot as last year, and was giving great, but brief views. Personally however, my highlight goes to, after a total of nearly 30 hours searching, i finally caught up with 2 LESSER-SPOTTED WOODPECKER as while listening to the males high pitched Green Woodpecker like song, i managed to pick up the female in my bins as she fed on a dying/dead silver birch tree, her pecking could be heard. A true moment of elation! All that time finally come good!

The Tawney Owl as usual was sitting on his tree.

But i was surprised when a Water Rail emerged in front of me adjacent to one of the pools, in late April!

25/04/13
An afternoon visit to Sheepwash was rewarded greatly! A little rain before the end of my lesson certainly helped Sheepwash, and there were actually some decent birds around! I was again surprised when scanning through the Gull flocks on the rocks, the 2nd summer YELLOW-LEGGED GULL re-appeared after a week of not being seen. As a matter of fact, it was almost a week to the hour!

I grabbed a few Digi-binned shots before the bird was flushed by a dog jumping into the water, the joys of urban birding. 2 Common Sandpiper were around the pool, one sharing the rocks with the Gull, the other on the other side of the pool.

 Moving on to the other side of the canal, i imminently picked up a stunning male Wheatear on the lower slops of the mound, which i gladly took a few pictures of! My first at Sheepwash! Walking up to the 'top' i was amazed when as i walked around, Wheatear after Wheatear appeared in front of me, and after around 30 Minutes, i was certain i had at least 8 birds scurrying around the mound! Awesome!
At least 3 of the birds seemed to be of the Leucorhoa race, better known as 'Greenland' Wheatear!

With a backdrop of Dudley Castle

MB