The Wyre, The Patch, A Green-Winged Teal and a Yellow Browed Warbler!

16/03/14

Having spent over 8 hours in a car the previous day, I decided to stretch my legs, so I decided on a very long walk from within the county of Shropshire back to Stourport, a route which would take me through a variety of woodlands, farmland and along the river. A good mix of habitats and hopefully I would check some areas that I may not have previously visited!

I didn't particularly plan very well though, so no map, or compass, just me, a sense of direction and some common sense.

The first standout bird of the walk came when I found one of the TWO-BARRED CROSSBILL at Postemplain, calling its head off from deep within the pines. Sadly however, apart from this though the surrounding pine plantations were rather devoid of life.

Moving across the road I then worked my way through the main bulk of the forest, along a variety of rather confusing path! Although very little wildlife was seen, it was great to be able to be somewhere, and not see, or hear a single person! I really was in the middle of no-where! I managed to find my way onto the Dowles Brook valley, and followed this all the way until it outflows into the River Severn. Sadly, again this was rather devoid of life, sadly still a little too early in the year for the forest to be back in the full swing of things!

At the outflow of the brook, a pair of Mandarin and a single drake Goosander were perched together on a log.

Continuing south, I finally made it back onto patch, where 2 Mandarin and 3 Goosanders were quickly located. Again though, from here, it all went quiet, and I finally plodded back home many hours after I first started out! A very tiring, but enjoyable walk!

17/03/14

A drake Tufted Duck was present on the reservoir behind my Dudley house! My 2nd of the spring!

20/03/13

A journey out to Sheepwash was rewarded with a flock of 11 Goosander, but other than that, it was rather hard to be enthused by the visit. Sadly, it has been very quiet at this location for most of the winter!

21/03/14

It was with luck, that the Green-winged Teal that had been found the week before had stayed around all week, and late on the Friday, some spare time had me heading over to Warwickshire for a couple of birds. Eventually, we made our way down to the flashes at Morton Baggot. Initially, there was no sign of the Teal as we scanned the closest flash (e.g. where it had been seen), but when walking further still, I could scan the distant flash, and among a small flock of Eurasian Teal was a 'yank' interloper with some white on it going the wrong way!

Drake GREEN-WINGED TEAL!

With the light fading, it was near impossible to digi-scope, but in my typical enthusiasm, I still tried!

A single Wigeon joined the Teal flock on the distant flash, but the most interest was on the near flash, where my first 2 LITTLE RINGED PLOVER of the year were feeding! I always have a moment of joy when picking up my first migrants of the year, and with LRP they are one of my favorites, so it was great to have seen them fresh in from Africa! 5 Green Sandpiper also probed the muddy edges of the pool, and a single Common Snipe made an appearance in the tussocks!

22/03/14

This morning was all about the Mandarins, and I fairly quickly located 7 along a stretch of the river. As you would expect, they were being very flirty this morning, and the males were rather aggressive towards each other. A fairly even split could be seen, with 4 drakes and 3 females, which is a typical count, with there usually being more drake Mandarins about than females.

One of the pairs were checking out one of the nestboxes, but had some trouble getting back out.  

Two of the 3 females:

And three of the four drakes.

Later the same day, we took the same route as we had the previous night, and after dodging a heavy rainshower, we arrived again to Morton Baggot, where we again found the GREEN-WINGED TEAL, but in much better light.

However, it was again distant of the far flash, but after about 10 minutes, it flew across to the near flash where we had great views of it as it fed adjacent to a small flock of Eurasian Teal again.

It spent much of its time hiding from us in the 'channels' in the field, and often dropped out of view, but it slowly dabbled its way closer to us. It never approached really closely, but scope views were decent. In the times the bird was running across between the channels, you could see just how different it was to Teal. Other than the obvious vertical white bar along the breast side, the extent of the salmon colour was also noticeably stronger. The head pattern also differed, with the yellow border of the green eyestripe being very pale, and almost non-existent.

Soon after though, and unknown reason sent the bird  into the sky with the rest of the Teal flock and dropped back onto the flash, where it fed alongside one of the Little Ringed Plovers from the previous night!

23/03/14

I had been wanting to catch up with the Yellow browed warbler again since i had brief, and somewhat unsatisfying views just before it went back to roost back in February. So, having arrived at Uffmoor wood for yet another visit we made our way along the track.

Within minutes, we had been thoroughly soaked and pelted with hail as we walked, but by the time we arrived at the far end of the wood it had cleared and we were treated to bright sunshine!

It was after just clearing the dreaded mud patch that i heard a call that i had been hoping for! The search had been made a whole lot easier!

The distinctive, loud 'Psweet' call rang out from the small birches adjacent to the track, and soon after, there hopping from branch to branch in a small area of holly was the stunning  yellow and green  of the YELLOW BROWED WARBLER!

Much easier than last time!

Over the course of the next 30 minutes, we were treated to good on/off views and it moved around, occasionally latching onto a passing flock of other small passerines. It quickly came clear it was particularly prone to doing this in the presence of both Goldcrest and Long-tailed Tits, but if it strayed from 'its' area too far it would double back and wait for the next flock to pass through its temporary territory.

In one of these 'passes' the bird gave stunning views down to about 15ft, but being so restless, i couldn't find it while trying to digi-bin it! A shame because at that range i may have actually got a decent photo of it!

I did manage to get one photo though that doesn't completely hide the bird behind twigs, but it was just flying off.

Take a look at those legs however! Bright yellow! Stunning!

The bird did manage to elude us for some time after this though, until it proclaimed its present from right next to the track!

It was feeding in the leaf litter!

Here we had prolonged views as it slowly hopped its way through the leaves, flicking them to find food underneath, in a similar fashion to Thrushes! I couldn't help but feel privileged to see this behavior, as it is something that I was not aware this species did! It just seemed so wrong for a 'Phyllosc' to be hopping around on the floor like that. Presumably this is something the bird had learnt in its presence within Uffmoor, as it would have been one of/the only place where it would have been able to find food during the 'colder' winter months?

If so, that is a great piece of opportunistic learnt behaviour from this eastern migrant!

As many of you many know, I have a bit of a 'thing' with 'Leaf warblers'. Each of them are incredibly smart looking birds, with those mossy greens and lemon yellows contrasting to clean white underparts! Combine that with their tiny size, their epic migrations and their scarcity, and you have a truly incredible bird!

To have one wintering in a rather shoddy Worcestershire woodland has been a pleasure!

MB

Its been a long time!

It really has been such a long time since my last post, and am just dropping by to say that posting will again commence from now onwards as i am now mostly done towards my coursework, which has been one of my biggest inhibiting factors. Having just returned from a birthday weekend away with 'The Girlfriend' it seems like a good time to fill in the gaps of the last month!

21/02/12

Talking about the Girlfriend, all the way back in February we went for a walk at Arrow Valley Lake as i knew that Goosanders had been seen there recently, and we quickly located 13 of these stunning ducks, including 7 drakes. 15 Tufted Duck were also around the lake, and a Reed Bunting was seen near the visitor center. We were also able to get some great close up views of BHG's, including a few nicely marked 1w birds!

A couple of Tufties were showing very closely nearby!

27/02/13

I again went for a walk to look for LSW in a woodland to no reward, i'm really struggling to catch up with them this year! A stunning male BRAMBLING was still showing, starting too acquire some aspects of summer plumage.

2 Green Woodpecker were showing well on some short cut grass.

 And i was happy to see that both of the resident pair of Tawney Owl were out on top of their stump.

28/02/13

A visit to sheepwash was fairly productive, 37 Goosanders was a very good count, one of my highest of the winter infact, as was 47 Pochard. 8 Shoveler were still present, and the Tuftie flock numbered 20. 30 Linnet were still up on the 'mound' proving as flighty as always. 5 Lesser Redpoll were showing well in the wooded bits.

1/03/13

Roost birding at Bartley revealed a Yellow-legged Gull, but i manadged to miss the Caspian that was being watched from the dam.

2/03/13

A quick twitchy stop into Bittel reveled that the stunning adult drake SMEW was still present, choosing to reside in the furthest corner possible from the viewpoint on the Bittel farm Causeway. The Smew was keeping company with a single female Goldeneye, while a flock of 10 Goosanders were also present.

3/03/13

A patch visit was fairly uneventful bar 2 Snipe which flew over my head at Blackstone.

6/03/13

Another visit for LesserPecker and again drew a blank. I have been spending regular 3-4 hours in this woodland frequently and still am failing to see them. 4 BRAMBLING were still around, as was a Peregrine and the Tawney Owl was perched up on the top of the tree in beautiful sunlight, highlighting those gorgeous rufous tones.

A Nuthatch was showing down to 6ft on some food that had been put out.

13/03/13

Another failure to find LSW. A male and a female BRAMBLING were still near to the feeders. The Tawney was still out, and the Peregrine was still in residence. A small flock of 10 Siskin were flighty.

14/03/13

Sheepwash was doing well at retaining the Shoveler flock, as there was now 9 birds, including 3 birds showing very well adjacent to the path. 13 Goosanders were widely spread across the pool, but the Pochard flock had halved to 20 birds. A Kingfisher did a flypast along the river.

15/03/13

I do love my roosts. Again i visited Bartley as a Med Gull had been roosting regularly  Neil Duggan was also in the area and dropped in also. It was like a big birders meet up as 8 birders were present, the most i have ever seen at the location. Eventually the stunner of an adult MEDITERRANEAN GULL was located while suffering the freezing wind. For me however, the highlight goes to a pair of Peregrine which shown very well off the dam, apparently a very rare bird at Bartley, as they hunted the roosting Gulls. A Curlew flew off as the Peregrines entered.

16/03/13

I have a fondness for Grimely due to its superb looking habitat, and with waders starting on the move it seemed like a logical choice. We first dropped into the Holt flashes, where a flock of 75+ Wigeon were feeding, along with a fair few Lapwing and two Oystercatchers. I picked up two GREEN SANDPIPERS which were either migrants or some of the wintering birds. Moving onto the Camp lane pits we added a drake Pintail and a small flock of 6 Curlew, 2 Redshank were on the flooded middle section as were 2 Oystercatcher.

Following this we dropped into Upton Warren where i quickly got the 14 Avocet. 3 OYC flew north and 1 Curlew was showing. 3 Chiffchaffs were my first 'spring' birds and 2 Water Rail shown. A single 1w Common Gull dropped in among the roosting Gulls.

17/03/13

I struck lucky on patch with 2 Greylag Goose, an insane patch rarity. I have only previously had fly overs but these two birds were 'decked' and were showing on the Lickhill pool.

  (You can see both birds in this photo, even if only a tiny portion of the 2nd birds head)

And now i can get into the more 'juicy' recent birds in my posts following this,

MB

Local surprises

7/02/13
I headed to Sheepwash Urban park following my lesson, and it turned out to be a fairly productive visit.
Upon my first view of the lake i quickly counted a small flock of 7 Goosander on the far side. It was while scanning the Pochard and Tufted Ducks that i heard a loud 'Wheooooo' call from my right. The superb evocative sound of a calling male WIGEON!

The bird was resting on the rocks for some time (cue digi-binned picture), before swimming off into the middle, calling almost incessantly, probably trying to say 'How the f**k did i end up here?!'.

I have only ever seen one previous Wigeon at Sheepwash, so i was well chuffed to see it!

The Pochard flock was at a low 24 birds, and similarly, Tufted Duck only counted 8! I was also glad to see that the 2 TEAL dabbling on the muddy shoreline.

Moving away from Pumphouse pool, i found a flock of 30c Chaffinch adjacent to the 'mound' along the Canel.

For any locals interested, the 'mound' atm is looking amazing for any passage Chats or Wheatears due to its open barron-ness, if your in the area, have a look!

MB

Still looking for White-wingers

31/01/13
So there i was again, Fens Pool. Very few Gulls were down on the pool, consisting of pritty much only BHG. However, i was pleasently suprised to count 47 Tufted Duck on middle pool alone, with a further 20 or thirty birds on both Fens and Grove Pool.
This being as urban a location it is, most of the flock were as tame as you would ever see. Some of the flock was showing down to 20ft!

When you have a look at them, Tufted Duck's are stunning birds!

Not to go too far off topic though. this brute of a 2w LBBG.

MB

Greater Scaup

12/10/12
A 1st winter drake Greater Scaup had been found at Upton Warren. A very uncommon seaduck in the midlands, and in particular from Worcestershire, as we lack many area of sufficiant open water, Therefore lacking many of the large Aythya flocks that are present in our surrounding counties.
So therefore, it was quite a nice 'tick' to get when a impromtu friday visit was organised. We headed or the Moors pool, and it didnt take very long to locate the SCAUP showing on the far side of the pool. Sadly to say, i wasnt at all left impresed by the bird. It was incredibly grotty (However some adult features were emerging) and not very interesting if im truily honest. But as always, it was nice to study its plumage and state of moult, which is something i always do enjoy looking at when looking at ducks.
 Moving from the West to the East side (in the hope of Jack Snipe) we knew we would be faced with direct sunlight into the hide, sillouetting everything. However, it again didnt take long to find the Scaup, showing slightly closer from this side.

A flock of 5 Wigeon were the only other birds of note away from the regulars.

13/10/12
And we were heading back to Upton for better photos of the Scaup (there really was very little better to do regional birding wise, honest!).
Again the Scaup refused to come anywhere near in decent light, and it was only at dusk, when all the ducks roosted on the East islands did the Scaup join them.

 

 

3 Wigeon, 2 Pochard, c20 Tufted Duck and c40 Shoveler were in evidence. However, the flock of c30 Snipe was by far the highlight from the 'runners up', as they probed their way between the tussocks.
MB

Sheepwash- Duck Influx

30/11/11

A visit to the Urban Mecca produced an influx in duck numbers, at the forefront, a Very large flock of 52 POCHARD. The flock contained more females than before so i am presuming that the influx is due to females arriving?

11 TEAL were seen from the raised path where they show very well (there starting to get used to walking people now!)

16 Tufted duck were on the main Pumphouse pool and johns lane pool,

Also on Johns lane pool, was a flock of 3 female GOOSANDERS.

A Grey Wagtail was showing on the river.

MB

Sheepwash- Return of the Goosander

14/11/11
An after 6th form visit ot the local mecca, Resulted in me and the Gornal Birder seeing a Male and Female Goosander on the pool, the light was dire, but ive been waiting for a Drake Goosander for ages, so took a film anyway.





Otherwhys there was little out of the ordinary here, so i made an effort to count the flocks of duck, 29 Pochard and 16 Tufted Duck was also present, as well as 9 Teal.
MB

2nd showing

27/12/10
Blackstone- Bewdley
i couldnt resist another peak at the smew, a bird this good on the patch and im willing to make the most of it!!!
well what can i say, a gorgeous bird posed gorgeously, at times down to about 5 metres, what a bloody great bird!!!



(A 2nd Win SMEW)


i spent a couple of hours here in the end, because the was some amazing birds that i may never see on the patch again.
there were 5 Drk GOLDENEYE moving up and down the river, and between bewdley town and blackstone there was 14 TUFTED DUCK ( a record count), another record count of 7 LITTLE GREBE also, a grey wagtail perched on roofs in bewdley town and an Ad COMMON GULL was sitting on the ice in bewdley town but flew around abit then flew north.

(Common Gull)
20c GOOSANDER were either on the unfrozen parts of the river or flying over, after checking the town centre for any anthya ducks (only tufties) we walked back downriver to blackstone as i had already pusshed time as i had to go out, but before we left we finally cought up with the 2 DIPPER on the river on the frozen ice at blackstone, and we had greay views, sitting out on the ice, diving into the fast flowing river, but eventually they flew off south below the road bridge.

what can i say, the patch has got me in its hold once again!!!!!!!
I LOVE MY PATCH!!!!!
GREAT BIRDS- GREAT PATCH- GREAT COMPANY!!!!
MB

Prime time Birding.

26/12/10
i have put so much effort in to get the blog up to date and finally it is, and what a day to do it on.
christmas had been as good as usual so when a report of goldeneyes on the river in bewdley surfaced very near to the patch i just had to be there, but luckily i did briefly change my mind to visit trimply instead but being -7.5 ouside that seemed a bit much so goldeneye hunting it was...
the plan was to park in Blackstone car park then just check the area. but alot of the plan was aborted when the area of river that is actually on the patch was completly frozen ( south of the road bridge) so we walked northward, clocking GOOSANDER, after goosander, in total 14 birds ( 3drk), we very quickly logged onto 3 LITTLE GREBE right in below the bank, including a bird which we though was frozen in the ice, luckilly after a few minuites it manadged to free itself and dived to join its 2 friends.
we got to behind the high school over the metal bridge when i spotted the GOLDENEYE feeding slightly upriver with its friend a drk goosander, i got into a positing where i could video the bird and got one short, wonky film before it and the goosander was flushed by walkers on the opposite side of the river, its wings humming as it went....





we had our target bird so decided to head back to the car with the hands struggling to turn the focousing wheel on my bins, we again found the goldeneye and after a minuite it was flushed once again by walkers on the opposite side of the river ( a major problem today), we decided that the bird had already been flushed twice so we left it to its own devices.

we crossed the metal bridge again and came to a small gap ( heading back downriver btw), where the bird of my patch dreams was,

In all its 1st winter splendor

A DRAKE SMEW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

A drake smew OMG, seriously DRAKE SMEW, sitting in front of me about 4-5 metres away, a drake smew!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!, before i even put my scope down i grabbed my camera from my pocket and put it to my bins before this bird was flushed to, and here it is: video no-1 of the bewdley smew:




yes. really crappy, but a white drake smew!!!!!!

now i had the confirmation video, i put my scope in the middle of the path ( could give a toss if somebody wanted to get past cause i just found a drake smew!!!!!) and spent about a min struggling to find it in my scope, but when i did:




yes i know, still really crappy, but all i ask from my photo's/videos's is that you can tell what the bird is and this is a 1st winter DRK SMEW!!

i got this video then for the 2nd time in 2 week phoned up birding today to tell them of my momentus discovery, but before the phone was answered a flock of 9 Goosander took flight and the smew took off with them, as did the single goldeneye, i didnt know what to do, drop my phone or pick up my bins, the birds flew south under the road bridge ( thus onto the patch) and i told the details, we very quickly got to the bridge but the birds had gone, but knowing that there was a little bit of open water open on the patch we hung around incase they flew back up ( as the goosanders do on the patch), they didnt so we went to the car to thaw out. where 2 reed bunting were in the car park. we drove around to bewdley as a last ditch fire attempt to relocate the bird, from the opposite side of the river, but although after walking all the way to the patch bridge there was no sign of the bird and only 5 goosanders ( 2drk), but i did manadge to find the whole flock of 5 goldeneye (all drk), whcih added to the bird that flew off was the total that was seen the day previous.

another 2 little grebe were noted, and an amazing flock of 11 !!!! tufted duck were on the river ( 5 drk) in the town centre, and 2 dipper were reported here this evening also. there was alot of birds presant so i did probs miss them....

and like i said in the last post what a way for the patch to hook me back in. 3 new patch birds in a week.....

1st win drk SMEW!!!

6 GOLDENEYE

14 goosander

11 tufted duck

5 little grebe

2 reed bunting

What a couple of hours can do to a patch birder eh......

MB

Its another patch 1st

7/03/10
yes,
yet another patch 1st,
i bet your getting bored with this now arnt you
well im not

this time it wasent an unexpected visitor, 14 great crested grebe on larford lake's (viewed from opposite side of river), a patch 1st simply because i had never really had a look at the place, a few were in summer plumage.
i even walked past the place which held the red backed shrike a few years ago(gut wrenching pain, but moveing swiftly on, not one comment on this bird please, pritty please)

4 tufted duck were on the lakes (3 DRK) which is a also quite uncommon on the patch with only 1 record of a pair on 1st june '07',
the drake gadwall was still holding teritory on redpoll lake, but has yet to find a female and make history...............
3 goldcrest were showing well at lincome lock, a grey wagtail was on a factory roof near the stourport marina and a total of 8 stock dove were located.....
MB