Driving, showers, pedalling and observing

A busy day with lots to do, so some restricted birding ensued, primarily catching up with birds found during the week.

3 cormorants at Arcot were reasonable for January- but little else there.

Green-winged teal at Backworth came with bonus short-eared owl and geese of the barnacle and white-fronted variety.

Up the coast with the crowds... No sign of the Iceland gull at QEII and an apparant miss with the great northern diver at Widdrington (drake scaup) but an seemingly eventual catch up with the water pipit at Druridge. No luck with the LBD

On the sea off Cresswell little of note, red throated diver and common scoter, but later, off Blyth there was a compensatory little auk close in shore.

As the "daylight" faded 2 long-eared owl and a few woodcock bought proceedings to a local end.

Glossed over

Another day, another trip up the coast.

Newbiggin was the first port of call, and after yesterdays failure to connect with Mediterranean Gull, today was better, with four easily available from the comfort of the car.

The Woodhorn goose flock remains unchecked, as traffic works prevented use of the lay-by - hopefully the Greenland White-fronted will hang on.

Lynemouth provided much better views of the Glossy Ibis - sunshine and a closer bird. No proper camera today, so an iPhone held to the scope for a record shot.

Lynemouth Glossy

Cresswell wasn't really checked as it was a pitstop for a quick chat with Alan, and later at Druridge the Green-winged Teal could not be seen. Compensation came in the form of three Pintail, half a dozen Shoveler, lots of Wigeon and Eurasian Teal.

Arrived at East Chevington along with Peter and spent the next hour or so hoping for the Bearded Tit / Bittern to show. Neither appeared.

I picked up the Green-winged Teal roosting on the north pool, and other duck included three Long-tailed, a Common Scoter, more Eurasian Teal, Wigeon, Shoveler, Goldeneye, Mallard and Pochard. The Grey-lag Geese group held the presumed escape Lesser White-fronted Goose. Two Whooper Swan lurked in the north-west corner too.

As darkness fell, the murmuration of Starling began - very impressive indeed!

Mobile birding

A day out with Mark on a dull, cold and wet January Saturday.

Nothing in the way of decent light for photography, so the scope was brought out instead of the SLR camera. First stop was Tynemouth so Mark could catch up with the increasingly promising Lesser Whitethroat - trapped during the week, so hopefully conclusive DNA results will determine it's origin. Complemented visit with some delicious cake courtesy of Celia and a nice catch up with Colin. Some great views of the Lesser Whitethroat on the close feeding station too...

Onwards to the Tyne Tunnel and eventually, albeit in slow traffic, to Boldon. The two Glossy Ibis were still present and despite some attempts with the iPhone to photograph them, the video function prove to be better in the blustering conditions - 17 seconds of ibis action below!

Northwards after this to beloved Amble for "refreshments", via an unsuccessful stop at Woodhorn for the Greenland White-fronts. Not to worry, the chip shop was open at Amble, where from we headed back down the coast in a race against fading light.

East Chevington came up trumps with the Slavonian Grebe on the north pool, three Long-tailed Duck, hods of Goldeneye and an otter.

Druridge Pools continued to hold Green-winged Teal, my first for a few years so appreciated. In addition, Pintail, Shoveler, lots of Wigeon, and among the Redshank, a single Black-tailed Godwit.

Green-winged Teal, Druridge.

We casually checked the flooded fields to the south of Blakemoor Farm (Cresswell) just after 15:00 - no sign of the Friday single Glossy Ibis, just a Grey Heron. The fields in the general area look good for any Ibis that chooses to linger, and it wasn't with much surprise to find that it was reported again at 15:30 - Cresswell Hall Farm this time.

A cheeky check of the River Blyth didn't produce Great Northern Diver, but the final stop at Horton Burn (east end) did hold a Kingfisher (and Moorhen!).

And that was that - dusk twists into night and another day birding ceases...

One

It was a later than anticipated start to the 2012 birding. Left the house at a little after 10:30 and headed north to East Chevington.

First up was the dapper drake green-winged teal on the South Pool, while on the North Pool I could not locate the reported smew ~ a female scaup was good, as was a single Eurasian white fronted goose and a fly thru short-eared owl.

Heading south to Cresswell I connected with the large pink-footed goose flock - a scope thru produced one tundra bean and one Eurasian white-front. No sign of any snow bunting at Bells Farm, and Cresswell itself was pretty quiet.

Onwards to Newbiggin - where med gull is a doddle these days, while a few hundred meters up the beach, the desert wheatear remains. Didn't carry the camera up with me today (given yesterday's session), yet I could not resist a couple of iPhone pictures ~

So with the wheatear in the bag I scuttled back to the car and headed south to Marden, where the wintering lesser scaup was eventually found roosting. So far so good!

A quick stop at Killingworth Lake did not produce anything of note, so a little later I arrived at Prestwick Carr. Superb showing of short-eared owl here, with a modest count of 12 ~ eight of which were in one field! Peter got me onto the great grey shrike just be it flew off into the distance - the quality just kept coming....

Back to the car for a nip up to West Hartford, not before a willow tit gave itself up. A mere 4 short-eared owl were on show by dusk (17 for the trip out!) - while the final, nearing dark, pitstop at Horton Burn was also rewarding - 1 kingfisher flew downstream, with 2 moorhen and 4 mallard. A day of quality!

Grim!

A cold, sleety day in the north-east. Saved by a couple of good birds though, with the desert wheatear still present just north of Beacon Point, and the drake green- winged teal at East Chevington. Didn't bump into the 'legs or connect with any geese, but can't complain.

Sunday highs and lows.

I had a brief sorte up to Druridge Bay this afternoon, heading direct to the Budge fields for disant views of the drake green-winged teal - he was mixed in with a healthy 30+ group of eurasion teal. Four shoveler were also present, and apart from lapwing and curlew there was not much else.

East Chevington held a good number of pink-footed geese, and it transpired later that a single tundra bean was present too. Dip 1. Four redhed smew were on the south pool and the north pool was quite barren.

Heading back down to Cresswell there was (again) no sign of the barn owl. Dip 2. And I failed to pick out the tundra bean goose that was reported later in the fields north of Bell's Farm. Dip 3.

No sign of the waxwing at Ashington (Dip 4), so it was back home via West Hartford. As usual (!) it was the highlight location of the day with twelve oystercatcher (great Feb' record), six eurasion teal, 27 lapwing and a few of bhg, hg, & cg. A single buzzard was noted in the northen fields.

Arriving home late afternoon I decided to pull the bird feeder closer to the house and have positioned a few branches near to the feeders in an attempt to provide some garden bird photography opportunies over the next few days... we'll see how successful it is as the first week of March progresses...