Sedges and Reeds (at Fishlake)

If there is one bird that is programmed to sing even when it doesn't want to its the Sedge Warbler. It just can't help itself. A few years ago (rather a few more than I care to imagine) before the Fishlake Meadows estate was built, and when the meadows were pumped out, the reed beds were basically confined to around the pumping station and along the fringes of the ditches, and as such, it was much easier to view the reedbed warbler population. During spring migration you could almost pick up Sedge Warblers from the bushes they were so confiding and obvious and it was hard to hear anything else over their cacophany. I am not complaining, the now largely flooded meadows have produced a quite large reedbed much of which is not accessible and that is generally a good thing for the wildlife inhabitants. Actually, I am complaining in that the houses should have been built with House Martins and Swallows in mind and a bit more scrub should have been left between the dwellings. Still I suppose scrub is hardly a thing you want between (un)affordable housing. Anyway I am probably a dinosaur.
Happily, recently, despite the relative lack so far of Reed Warblers, there has been a large fall of Sedge Warblers, so large in fact that it is often quite difficult to hear anything else that might be secreting itself in the reeds. I have found it quite difficult to observe these noisy, rather harsh little warblers in the last couple of years as they largely sing from the bottom to middle of the reedbeds and rarely pop up unless song flighting. This year however small sapling willows that are sprouting everywhere are providing ideal higher song posts and its just a matter of finding a singing individual in the reedbed and waiting patiently for it to move upwards.
So I did.

This one seemed almost reluctant to perform but just couldn't help itself once I was relatively under cover and stopped singing (and listening occasionally) only to eat a surprise bug that came its way

before carrying on singing almost embarrassed by its interruption

There were lots to choose from given a little patience of which I include just a couple of others

From a distance I thought I had some strange new species here until I realised it was just the shadow of the leaves...

During all this Sedge activity I was delighted to find three pairs of Reed Bunting nesting in a relatively small patch. I only got a few not very good photos of females so I am only going to include one rather indignant male.

During my brief sojurn I can also report that there were two male Cuckoos, umpteen Mallards, plenty of breeding Gadwall (some with chicks), Kestrel, Buzzard, one singing Reed Warbler, two male Pochard, nine singing Cettis (possibly up to eleven), more than ten Blackcaps, a few Chiffchaff, at least a dozen Whitethroats, two Canada Geese, at least one pair of Greylag, several Grey Heron, Coot and Moorhen,  a hundred or more Herring Gull, all the rest of the normal Tits, Wrens, Blackbirds, Robins etc, quite a few rats, no Water Vole again, but two Roe Deer.
The Greylags were very flighty although not exactly shy as this close fly by shows.

I apologise to any species I missed out, it was either because I considered you sensitive or just down to plain forgetfulness.

Patience is a virtue

Every now and again time and effort (and a little bit of knowledge) reward you with an opportunity. Not every time, but just occasionally, and when they do, you have to grab the chance and be grateful for it. I set out to Fishlake Meadows yesterday earlyish in the morning with 4 key objectives in mind from which I was determined not to be distracted. Of course I knew I would be. However, my number one was to get a proper shot of a Cettis Warbler rather than the bush it was in a moment ago or a blurry reminder of the limitations of autofocus when confronted with a viewfinder full of sticks. Number two was a decent view of Sedge Warbler which usually seem quite strangely reticent to show themselves in this locality. Number three was the same with Whitethroats. Number four was a ridiculous notion that one of the two Purple Herons spotted over a local garden the day before might just pop up in the vicinity.
In reality, I didn't have all day, and once in situ I decided to spend my time with the Cettis. I know most of the territories here, or I thought I did, and headed for the one I thought most likely. I'm not sure why I thought it most likely, its one of the individuals I have only glimpsed on a handful of occasions, but sure enough, on my approach I was greeted by the now familiar and  unreasonably loud call by the ruler of this particular kingdom. I stood for a while and its next shout was about 10 yards away, but I knew from bitter experience to avoid the temptation of following it. I waited, stood where I was. I waited twenty minutes. Another call close to, but as usual from the bottom of the dense bushes. Then all of a sudden a flurry of activity as two fluttered about at the back of the bush in front of me, then all quiet again. Calls from 5 yards to the right, 5 yards from the left odd sightings of a dark skitting form in the shadows and cramp was setting in. I kept reminding myself of what a lovely morning it was and how lucky I was to be here. Suddenly this secretive bird which isn't all that often seen despite betraying its presence with the loudest of all British Warbler calls, decided to work its way up a bush in front of me, and not oly that, at the front of the bush rather than the back, which is normal. It sat there and gave me a good hard stare

Only my finger moved on the shutter button which he listened to with interest

I still didn't move, I couldn't, and he disapprovingly gave me a burst of song

and paused to see if there was any effect

there wasn't so he treated me to another longer burst

before once again giving me a very direct look of disbelief that I hadn't been scared away

And then he was gone. All over in fifteen seconds which seemed like fifteen minutes, and well worth the hour standing still. Over the years I've taught myself its much better to wait and let wildlife come to you rather than to stomp about trying to find it, and its certainly the case for the elusive Cettis Warbler. A lesson reinforced.

I did catch up with Sedge Warblers of which more later.

The sky over my back garden

I am miles behind on publishing photos. I have quite a number of posts to do from a long weekend's birding last week with my good friend Russ from Nottingham, however, I am going to start with today. We have had a long spell of glorious, almost unbroken skies this month, but out of the sun, there has still been a bit of a chill in such wind as we have had which has predominately been North to North Easterly. This combined with apparently poor weather over the Pyranees has made the spring migration somewhat on the slow side this year, but a steady trickle of birds have been arriving. Today the wind has shifted right round to Southerlies with a noticeable shift in air temperature which has been reflected in the shortening of many people's trousers, including my own.
A quick sortie around Fishlake Meadows yesterday seemed to prove the wind to be a factor, light though it has been, as the day heralded my first Swifts of the year with about 50 hunting over the main pool, and a similar number of House Martins. Two Cuckoos added humour to the birdsong, although not I suspect for any listening Reed Warblers.
Anyway. Today. Amongst other things I was mostly gardening today, and as usual I was poorly prepared and found myself running in and out for binoculars as four Buzzards had a small skirmish lowish over the park, closely observed by a better prepared Sparrowhawk circling high above them. I have seen odd pairs here recently, but not like the mass meetings earlier in the month. Nevertheless I am starting to think that this must be the edge of several territories. A short while later, I ran (optimistic terminology) in to get my camera as another three turned up circling and drifting towards overhead. One turned off in the opposite direction and left this lovely pair displaying their affection for eachother. Lots of photos and no words to follow.
Please click on them to see them in their full, glorious, effortless show of disregard of gravity. 

This is one of the reasons I love gardening.

Arne, Radipole, and Portland.

There are times when I love watching nature on my own, when you can stop and sit and absorb your surroundings at will, and there are times when its a real pleasure to have someone to share your experiences with. This long weekend I spent birding with someone whose company I really enjoy with whom I visited places I probably wouldn't have gone to on my own.
The Friday plan was to find Dartford Warbler for which we intended to head to Studland Heath where good views were almost guaranteed. However, I got a bit greedy and decided we would drive to Arne or Middlebere first and look for Spoonbill and Osprey, before making our way round Poole harbour to Studland, then back across the chain ferry.
We arrived at Arne and navigated our way across the heath to the tune of the occasional Willow Warbler to a viewpoint where we were assured we might see an Osprey in a dead tree somewhere. Sadly, dreadfully, but not unexpectedly, we failed, although on the way we did see Skylark, Meadow Pipit and Linnet amongst other small brown jobs, and then a pair of Dartford Warblers which disappeared into the undergrowth the moment I took my lens cap off.
A little further on we disappeared into the hide (the whole purpose of a hide) which overlooks Middlebere channel and were greeted by views over 100 upon 100 of Black Tailed Godwit. We made various guestimates without counting but came up short of the official count of around a 1000, quite a sight. No definite Spoonbills, and not even a glimpse of a raptor, we headed back.
Near the end of our walk we heard and then saw an obliging Dartford who stood up for a few seconds scolding us for passing his territory

The best laid plans of mice and birders suddenly changed. On a whim, from heading south east we decided to head south west to the reserves of Radipole and Lodmoor. These aren't my favourite places for really only one reason. Background traffic noise. So close to busy Weymouth, particularly from Easter onwards, its difficult to pretend you are in a reedbed wilderness, although the birds manage to.
Several Sedge Warbler and a number of Cettis Warbler made themselves spectacularly obvious over the sound of internal combustion engines, and briefly one Reed Warbler tried but gave up as we approached it at Lodmoor. Most interesting I thought were the large number of Dunnocks which fequented the path and seemed mostly oblivious to people sharing the walkway

Plans unchanged for the moment, we headed for Radipole in the hope of something spectacular. Sure enough, an apparent local celebrity was present seemingly, a Hooded Merganser. Ok so this wild vagrant fish and invertebrate eater happily swam to people and ate bread from their hand, but we still took a while to find it. Still in the meantime we wandered round listening to Cettis and Sedge Warblers without really getting a good view (except once when I wasn't ready so didn't count).. About halfway round on a small bridge we heard a Cettis close to, so we stopped and sat on the wall for a while to see if it would pop up. Both of us recalled waiting on a similar wall on a similar bridge at Slapton Ley in Devon, hoping for a similar view of the then very rare Cettis Warbler. How fabulous it is to have a warbler that is not just extending its range but its numbers on these shores, or almost any bird for that matter. After about half an hour we rewarded with a typical 2 second view of this secretive bird, and just for a change I was a bit too slow with the camera. My camera shoots 7 frames per second, so these two subsequent pictures gives you an idea quite how quick you usually have to be to get a good shot (which I didn't)

This is my most successful attempt yet, but I will persevere and try to stop taking photos of bramble bushes at Fishlake.
On the way back we did find the Hooded Merganser, it was hard not to, as people were feeding it bread. So I include just the one photo for posterity. Wildfowl collection escape? Erm well yes. Still, its not its fault, as an individual entity its still a dapper bird, I just hope someone finds a friend for it to play with.

At this point we should have headed home having strayed somewhat from the itinerary (like not stuck to it at all) but like all good birders away from home we decided to take a slightly deviant route via Portland Bill.
Despite the glorious sunshine, there was a distinct chill in the gentle breeze off the Bill as we set off along the coast path in a fruitless search for Purple Sandpipers on the rocks. Apart from the occasional Swallow coming in off the sea, things were pretty quiet although we did get nice views of this Rock Pipit

 and it got not so nice views of us

It is not entirely surprising to find this bird ringed as it was just below the bird observatory which we visited next. The good and very informed people there welcomed us in to see what had been noted through the day and we spent a pleasant hour on the sheltered terrace enjoying the sunshine and looking over the garden for spring arrivals. Again it was pretty quiet, the only migrants being one Willow Warbler and a steady trickle of Swallows.

Walking back through the beach huts Russ spotted this fine Black Redstart which took a liking to the beach hut roofs

I stood and waited for it to fly, hoping to catch the bright orange flash from its spread tail, but this bird had other ideas and spectacularly avoided its most prominent feature being digitally recorded

That was the height of the excitement on the walk back, although it was lovely to see Linnets showing the first pink blushes of spring

Weekend rapture

I am going to start my weekend early, as on thursday I set a new garden record of 10 circling Buzzards in the late morning. To be honest, I'm not sure what my previous record was, probably 4 or so, although my record for Hampshire is 11 a few miles away at Lee.
I was looking for early displaying birds at Lee a couple of weeks back as it was a nice day and came across 4, birds not displaying, but one behaving very aggressively, particularly towards one rather tatty looking individual. I managed a few rather poor shots of the high up raptors, and its interesting to see a Buzzard being knocked upside down by another. The very striking pale aggressor looked so much like a Rough legged Buzzard in markings and in its slightly more robust body, that I stopped photographing it to watch it hoping to catch a view of its back, but it wasn't playing the game.

I am pretty sure that this pale bird was one of my 10 on thursday, I am also pretty sure that it is just an unsually strikingly marked pale Common Buzzard although by no means certain. Its quite hard to believe its the same species as these two that were hanging about in the vicinity..

or this one with no tail banding whatsoever

Anyway, a very variable species which I could (and do sometimes) watch for hours. On saturday, glorious sunshine in the morning had me heading out into the garden pretending to do gardening. Fortunately I had my most important gardening tool with me, binoculars. Unfortunately I didn't have my second most important gardening tool with me, a camera, as the batteries were on charge in the kitchen. Weeds were the big winners as Buzzards came over in ones, twos, threes and fours, much to the distaste of two Sparrowhawks, and I was treated to some excellent low views and great interactions before recording a total of eight Buzzards all circling together.
After a while they had all dispersed and disappeared and I wandered up to the shed with full intentions of grabbing a hoe. I glanced over the wall, and sat on a television aerial 4 houses up was a spectacularly powerful looking raptor. I did a double take and mentally pinched myself. No, I wasn't dreaming or imagining things, it was without doubt a Peregrine. A first for me here. I ran indoors, grabbed the batteries out of the charger, fumbled about trying to fit them upside down, and eventually ran back up the garden. It was still there. However, as I readied myself, my shirt sleeve caught on a cut off branch of a now dead creeper which had been growing on the garage wall which sprang back against the wall with a sound like a pistol shot. Peregrine gone. And I was frustrated for the rest of the day.
Sunday's gardening was more organised. Camera charged and ready on the garden table, eyes in the sky and not on the vegetable beds. Disappointingly two Buzzards passed over very high, and then nothing for an hour. Then a single bird circled over a bit lower which I tried to photograph really badly, but while I was doing so, two Sparrowhawks again arrived which were almost in range, so I concentrated on one of those

As I was looking through the viewfinder, another bird arrived, and.... hang on.... deep forked tail! Red Kite! Another first for me as a garden spot although I have seen them on a couple of occasions locally.

So all in all I am giving up going birding in anywhere but my back garden where I am fully expecting tomorrow morning to see a couple of Gyr Falcons and a Golden Eagle.

Ringed Little Ringed Plover

On Tuesday I had to pop down to Poole and intended to spend an hour at Middlebere on the west side of the harbour, but the pleasant weather and Easter school holidays meant that traffic was awful, so I headed back and decided to pop into Blashford lakes near Ringwood which was at least halfway home. The Tern hide was revealing very little anywhere close, but some other birders provided pleasant conversation to pass the time. I had a Ringed Plover pointed out to me and found a Green Sandpiper, Little Ringed Plover, Goldeneye, Black tailed Godwit, Goosander, nesting Lapwing, probable White Wagtail, and various other species myself. It was interesting without being remarkable until the stars of the show flew over to take centre stage in front of the hide..

3 Little Ringed Plovers hit the shoreline a few feet away, a pretty obvious pair and one extra for good measure. The female of the pair settled down in a small scrape, and the male danced around bobbing up and down and calling

I noted that the male was wearing some bling on its right leg, and blow ups of these photos revealed part of the number which thanks to John Clark is identified as a male ringed as a nestling at a nearby site in 2004. I was expecting amorous activity after all this showing off, but both seemed to lose interest

Meanwhile the single bird wandered along the shoreline in front of me affording great close view, and I wonder if the pale patch around the ear coverts would suggest to a more informed birder than I, a first year bird

While all this was going on, a pair of Little Grebes were bathing between the roosting poles, a seemingly unnecessary activity for a bird that spends so much time underwater, but fun to watch all the same