Juvenile Honey Buzzard

At the point just before 7:00am. By 9:00am I'd had a few hundred Swallows and Sand Martins moving south-east along with 113 Yellow Wagtails, 2 Tree Pipits, a Grey Wagtail, Green Sandpiper and Whimbrel. Along the beach were 28 Wheatears and a Whinchat. The highlight was a juvenile Honey Buzzard which Jacob picked up coming in from the north. It landed in the Trapping Area and eventually took off and headed south down the coast. Even though I was relatively close to the HB as it took off from the Trapping Area  and started to gain height, the heat haze and hand holding a 1,100mm lens meant that almost all of my photos were horrendously out of focus. Or, which is more likely I was very wobbly and had the camera on the wrong settings!

Juvenile Honey Buzzard

Wood Warbler and Wryneck

Not managing to get to the Obs until 18:00 the sun whilst still fairly high had disappeared behind some cloud. A handful of birders were searching for the Wryneck in the moat and a recent report indicated that the Wood Warbler was still in the large Sallow. After a short while of not being able to locate the Wryneck myself and Ross Newman were the only people still looking. Ross had a thermal imaging scope with him and managed to locate the Wryneck some 40 yards west of the moat feeding under some broom. Ross kindly indicated to me that he had re-found it and left me watching whilst he went to gather up the other birders. 

Many thanks to Ross, otherwise it is almost a certainty that I wouldn't have seen the Wryneck.

After watching the friendly Wryneck I wandered over to the large Sallow to see if the Wood Warbler was still showing. After just missing it I waited and eventually it re-appeared and showed extremely well feeding at the front of the net ride. Even though it was late evening when the sun came out the light conditions were superb.

After getting superb views of the Wood Warbler I went back to see if the Wryneck was still in the same place. It was and seemed to be having a bit of a doze as at times its eyes would close for a few seconds. No one else was around and I left the Wryneck at 19:30, wandering back to my car.

Neither the Wryneck or Wood Warbler were re-located the next day although our fourth Wood Warbler for the year was found by Richard at the Long Pits.

Plenty of good birds

A day of light rain showers until at least late afternoon was a very welcome experience after months of hot dry weather. I started the day off at the top of the Long Pits and it was mostly quiet until I came across a couple of foraging tit flocks amongst which were several Willow Warblers and Lesser Whitethroats but only 16 of each, also 10 Swifts SE over.  I then moved on to Hanson hide, where Martin and Colin had earlier seen a couple of Wood Sands and Green Sands. One of the Wood Sands was close.

Wood Sandpiper

In addition to Martins sighting there were five Garganey in front of the hide.

Garganey

Several Snipe were visible from Hanson, the VC and Firth Lookout.

Snipe

The Pintard (hybrid Pochard x Pintail) was feeding.

Pintard

Whilst watching the Common Tern colony from Firth, an adult Lesser Black-backed Gull predated one of the tern chicks. I wanted to know how many chicks there were as I knew of at least two other predation events by gulls on the colony, so I stomped to the back of Burrowes and was able to get a better view of the colony.

I counted at least 12 chicks, one of which was a week old and the others mainly three weeks old. When I returned to Firth I could see another four chicks from that side, so a total of at least 16 chicks. Lets hope some survive the gull onslaught! There are six chicks in this photo and what looks like a dead Sand Martin on the shingle to the right of the standing adult Common Tern.

Both Black Terns and the White-winged Black Tern were still showing from Firth.

Black Tern

Black and White-winged Black Terns

White-winged Black Tern

Three Bar-tailed Godwits appeared on the mud in front of Firth along with over 30 Dunlin and Ringed Plovers.

Bar-tailed Godwits

Mostly adult Dunlin, I think there is one juvenile in the shot, Ringed and Little-ringed Plover.

More Tern action

I was doing a duck count on the reserve this morning and picked up the juvenile Little Gull at ARC that Martin had seen yesterday. There was another or the same juvenile seen on Burrowes during the morning. After some rain during the night the early morning felt very humid and it was quite tiring going around the reserve. The White-winged Black Tern was still showing in front of the Firth lookout and was a bit closer than yesterday although the hazy conditions made for tricky photography. 

I didn't think it was worth taking any shots of it in flight due to the hazy conditions.

Whilst standing at Firth a flock of seven Black-tailed Godwits flew in and landed on the exposed mud.

Black-tailed Godwits

At Dengemarsh and almost at the end of the duck count, I met up with Martin who had just left Dengemarsh hide but decided to join me back in the hide. It wasn't too long before Martin located a juvenile Caspian Gull that he had found earlier. I think this might be the first juvenile Caspian Gull that I have seen. Needless to say it was about as far from the hide as it could get.

Juvenile Caspian Gull

After finishing my duck count I would come back to Firth around late afternoon, when hopefully the light conditions might be better.

By early afternoon it had clouded over and a SW breeze was blowing through the screen at Firth however, the White-winged BlackTern and a Black Tern were sat on the mud at Firth.

Dave Scott shot this excellent video of the White-winged Black Tern.

After a while a second Black Tern appeared and at times all three marsh terns were feeding together and relatively close, best observed from Makepeace hide. I couldn't get all three in one shot but did manage two.

Juvenile White-winged Black Tern and Black Tern

Two juvenile Black Terns

White-winged Black Tern

Sort of co-found a juvenile White-winged Black Tern on Burrowes this morning with Peter Eerdsman who thought he had seen it earlier from the visitor centre. This is the fourth one I have found/co-found since moving to the peninsular in 2019. When Peter and I were checking the id it had landed amongst the resting Common Terns on the muddy area in front of the Firth lookout. Once the news was put out it moved towards the back of Burrowes and began feeding, never coming too close.

Juvenile Black Tern on Burrowes too.

Juvenile White-winged Black Tern

Juvenile Black Tern

Juvenile Black Tern