A Whole Lotta Rosy
Rosy Starling at Spurn & Blacktoft Sands RSPB, East Yorkshire
15th August 2005
With things being soul-destroying-suicide-inducingly quiet at my south Manchester patch, and the only rare, relatively local bird being a Purple Heron in Staffordshire (which would have necessitated a nine year wait in a cramped hide, surrounded by cobwebs, just to get a split second view of a stripey heron in flight), it was decided that we would go for a very pretty Rosy Starling at Spurn. Arriving just before 10am at the Bluebell cafe in Kilnsea, we were soon treated to an excellent close view of this pretty little birdy. Loosely associating with a large flock of Starlings, it was quite mobile ranging up to a mile, but with patience it continued to return to the Bluebell. Not as pristine as I would have liked, it was still a nice looking bird.
What a view! The dramatic Spurn Peninsula
Other birds in the area between the Bluebell and Canal Scrape included 8+ Yellow Wagtails, 2 Wheatear, Willow Warbler and plenty of Swallows. Sarah found 2 Turtle Doves when suddenly her mum phoned. Sarah informed her that she'd just found 2 Turtle Doves, but that they weren't in a pear tree, to which I had to drown her in the Humber for cracking such a crap joke, not to mention a joke that didn't even make any sense seeing as it was a Partridge in a pear tree etc... After a seawatch that left me cataleptic (2 Fulmar, 3 Gannet, 2 Sandwich Tern, 1 Common Scoter, 3 Madeiran Storm Petrels and a dead cow), we relocated the Rosy Starling sat on the roof of the Bluebell. Unable to get my camera out in time, it pissed off before I could shoot any piccies, when Phil Woollen from Chester turned up just a few seconds too late. Luckily an enterprising birder had decided to bait the sides of a puddle with bread and, thankfully, Phil later had great views of the Rosy drinking and munching away.
A swift half in the Crown and Anchor was followed by a short drive to Long Bank to see if we could pick up a juvenile Montagu's Harrier that had been in the area for the last couple of days, but no luck. However, a tiny female Ruff with a longish bill put the frighteners on me and Phil for a few seconds as it made short dashes in the long grass, flycatching and generally not behaving all that much like a Ruff. With the sun turning the inside of the car into a kiln by the sea (Kilnsea!!!), we left the turnip fields of Spurn for the spectacular Humber bridge, briefly passing through the turnip fields of Lincolnshire, and then back into more turnip fields in East Yorkshire and to Blacktoft Sands Turnip reserve...
The Crown and Anchor (pointless photo)
Ruff (crap photo)
The last time I visited Blacktoft Sands RSPB I almost lost a kidney through laughing so much. In a hide at the west end of the reserve a very nice (but as you will see clearly deranged) woman announced to her husband (and loud enough for a full hide to hear) that she'd found some deer. With things being pretty quiet on the bird front, everyone immediately switched to having a look for them. Her husband told her that he couldn't see any in the area where she had indicated, so she found them in the 'scope for him. After a world weary sigh, he embarrassingly had to correct her and inform her that they were actually rabbits. Rabbits!!! The hide seating soon began to rock back and forth with the muffled hysterics of some bloke sat next to me. Upon seeing this bloke trying to stifle his laugh I could do nothing but join in and rock the hide some more! The woman took it in good cheer, but her husband (or possibly her carer?) was extremely keen to get out of there.
Unfortunately nothing quite so infantile happened today, but there was an excellent selection of birds. In the same hide as the Rabbitgate incident, I scored my first Little Stint of the year, as well as amazing close views of commoner waders, especially Dunlin, but I couldn't find the 2-3 Curlew Sandpipers that had been present earlier in the day. A Barn Owl gave brilliant, if somewhat surreal, views sat in his little Owl house and a very bleached and tatty male Marsh Harrier made the occasional pass over the edge of the reeds to scare the shit out of the sludge-brown mass of feathers known as 'eclipse ducks'. I'm pretty sure the harrier was just bored and a bit lonely as he never once actually bothered to try and kill anything.
Barn Owl
Dunlin
Down at the far west end of the reserve, from the Singleton hide, a Spoonbill had been in residence for quite a while. How a bird so distinctive and gregarious could be so difficult to see is beyond me, but this one was just that. Somehow it repeatedly managed to vanish behind a small island before giving a full hide of birders just enough time to stick their Nikon Coolpix cameras onto their scopes, but then vanishing again before they could depress the shutter. "Bollocks" was uttered all round on a frequent basis. Whilst waiting for these tantalisingly brief views of the Spoonbill there was plenty of other birds to sift through including 8 Spotted Redshank, Green Sandpipers, Avocet and a fair few common waders.
Curlew and Spotted Redshank
As the light began to fade rapidly and the opportunity for good photos passed by, the Spoonbill decided to come out into the open. I managed a few piccies of it surrounded by the horrific image of a flock of eclipse Mallards.
Swan with severely deformed bill
After a night in Scunthorpe, we stopped off at Old Moor RSPB on Tuesday afternoon for a 2 second glimpse of 2 Ruddy Shelduck before they decided to piss off to Broomhill Flash - selfish bastards. Good job they are just escaped, plastic pieces of crap...