Snow Goose

Made you look! Sorry, that should be snow and a goose, the goose being a Pale-bellied Brent which was on Colyford Marsh this afternoon, I saw it distantly from the Farm Gate after hearing about it from Ian M. It's the only noteworthy bird I've seen today. It was a patch yeartick for me though after having missed a few earlier ones.

This morning I was very surprised to see just how much snow had fallen overnight, it was definitely the most I've ever seen on the ground in Seaton. It was the first time I've seen the beach white over, Beer Head too for that matter. Here's a couple of photos of the lovely scene after the sun had come out:

Seaton Beach as I've never seen it before.

Trying to be artistic.

Talking of artistic, Martha and I were itching to make a snowman but I was still feeling a little bit anti-human after yesterday's fine display of humanity in action. We therefore made a snow dog instead. Not exactly an ice sculpture but better than a boring old snowman any day!

A few hours later it was just three pebbles on a table.

A Day of Mixed Emotions

This morning the Abberton Traps at Seaton Marshes ended in frustration when, with well over a dozen Shelduck feeding in the trap, it failed to activate properly and we caught nothing. Still it was a lovely morning to be on the marshes and the ducks were bound to be the same reckless bunch we caught on Saturday anyway.

After getting home it was time to feed the Skylark, she gobbled up her worms with relish but she was trying to tell me something, I got the feeling she was ready to go. I'd had her held captive now for 19 days and she was much, much better. Her flying wasn't exactly A1 yet but I figured she needed to be able to fly freely and more often so as to strengthen the wing up. She had been trying to fly within the confines of her small cage, which could do more harm than good. So before I changed my mind I put her in a small box, took her to Axe Cliff and gave her her freedom. I'd like to say she flew off strongly, but adequately would be a better description. She flew around 30yards or so before landing in the field, I got my bins from the car but failed to relocate her. I was happy to see her go but also worried it may all have been in vain. Oh well, I tried...

It was such a glorious morning I took the dog for a nice long walk along part of the coast path I was hoping to see a very early Wheatear, (not beyond the realms of possibility) but didn't. I was however very fortunate to get some superb views of a pair of these.

Magnificent! I felt really privileged that they allowed me such close views. They were a joy to behold!

I haven't mentioned where they actually were, obviously anyone with local birding knowledge will know already. I'm also not going to mention what they are either ( coz you can see that can't you?) so as to stop any persons with questionable motives from finding this post via a Google search. I've no doubt they're out there...

The real low point of the day occurred as I drove home from a visit to Colyton, during a small sleet storm. I was driving down a lane worrying how the Skylark would fair in this abrupt change of weather when I spotted a dejected looking Black-headed Gull squatting at the edge of the road. I stopped the car and approached it but it flew (rather weakly) further down the lane and just out of sight. I got back in the car and drove into a nearby lay-by, I was just getting out to go after the gull when a vehicle came towards me, a four by four with a young man at the wheel. It stopped and reversed rather urgently. 'He's seen the gull' I thought, 'Hope he's not hit it' Seconds later he came back and drove on. I drove back down the lane fully expecting to see the worst, But it was WORSE even than that!! He'd clearly run over it ON PURPOSE!! I was shattered. I know it's only one of millions of BHGs but it just made me ashamed to be part of the human race. Just to show I'm not exaggerating look at the evidence:

See how the tyre tracks show the vehicle swerved off the road in order to run over the helpless thing. I despair :(

After stopping in a lay-by for a little cry ( a bit (lot) pathetic I know), I pulled myself together and went to have a look at the handful of gulls on the river on my way home. I saw this nice Iceland Gull, quite a dark one, possibly the 'dark one' or 'Derek' if you prefer Gav. :p

Is this Derek? Poor photos due to hand held camera AND scope!

Weekend Wittering

I didn't get time to write anything on here yesterday, I was so tired after work I went straight to bed without my Horlicks. I had gotten up at around five to go to Seaton Marshes where the AERG were Canon Netting for the last time this winter. We had a good catch of 39 birds (32 Shelduck and 7 Mallard) 15 of which were 'fresh' birds. There were sixteen of us, so the birds didn't take long to process and we were finished by 8:30.

This drake Shelduck was doing his Indian Runner Duck impression. Mike took this picture- I don't think he liked ny hat!!

Whilst at Seaton Marshes I got a text from Phil saying the Red-necked Grebe and a Black-throated Diver were at Bransccombe, so seeing as we'd finished nice and early I decided to go and try for the grebe for the fourth time! When I arrived Phil and Ian M were still there and immediately got me onto the RNG, which was much nicer than the October one because it was coming into summer plumage. I had missed the Black-throated Diver though and although I was keen to string a couple of distant divers into the black-throated variety, Phil and Ian insisted they were too distant to ID with any certainty, so it will have to remain another patch year tick to look forward to! After Phil and Ian had left it drifted slightly closer, close enough to digiscope I thought. There was a problem though. I had picked up my scope from home on the way but hadn't collected my digiscoping camera. I did have the S3 with me which is woefully inadequate when it comes to digiscoping. I have to have to scope set to almost full zoom (!!) to get it to work at all.

The Red-necked speck is in this photo.

The s3's attempt. Viciously cropped and attempted to sharpen, you can tell it's a Grebe, perhaps. You'll have to take my word for it that it's Red-necked.

A while later more birders turned up to see it, including Doug and Clive:

They've seen it but are somehow managing NOT to jump up and down like Tigger! ;-)

Before work I had a quick look along the estuary and saw a single drake Gadwall (which Nick had texted me about earlier) looking really out of place. We seem to have had a lot more of these than usual so far this year.


Today I had a much needed lie in and missed another Black-throated Diver at Branscombe, Phil texted the news at around midday. I don't know what time he'd seen it at but I wasn't going to go anywhere near Branscombe on a sunny and 'warm' (compared to some recent weather) Sunday afternoon. In fact everywhere in the Axe Vally was teeming with sun- starved humans today and when I walked the dog along the Coly late morning, I thought I'd inadvertently stumbled into the 'Pedigree Chum' dog cross country championships!! So no decent birding today.

This evening I found myself down at Seaton Marshes again because another member of the AERG had contacted me because she had found a dead Sparrowhawk. I wanted to see it, firstly because I wanted to check it hadn't been shot, or trapped in any way and secondly because I've never seen one up really close, so even a dead one would be better than nothing. It was a first winter bird and upon examination was found to be incredibly emaciated, so had more than likely starved to death, poor thing. Obviously not enough prey around at this time of year. I wonder how many young Sparrowhawks starve to death each winter? I know some people would say " not nearly enough". I'm happy to declare that I'm not in that camp. For some reason I just had to take the unfortunate's corpse home to show my 'lucky' family, who weren't in the least bit surprised by this very 'normal' behavior on my part. The cat was literally terrified of it! Perhaps he's had a nasty encounter with one while on his travels, it makes me wonder....

On a happier note my Skylark (remember that) is still alive and very well. A couple of days ago I gave Steve the wing measurement and he was able to tell me it was a female. Well, she managed to take off from the floor for the first time on Friday and yesterday flew up two flights of stairs. She's been getting a lot stronger and more active since I've been feeding her insects and worms in addition to seed. I do this by scattering compost and leaf mould in the cage and letting her find all the tasty morsels herself. I think I'll be able to release her very soon but may have to wait until late next week because there are gales forecast for Tuesday. Here's a video of her foraging for insects.