Filey Dams, Nosterfield and Staveley.

 The past week has been spent helping the eldest granddaughter move back home from university and undergoing a procedure at Selby hospital.

Fairly quiet at Filey Dams, I missed the squacco heron, but that is the joy of birding. Lots of young birds about, the only birds without young were tufted ducks and gadwall. A little ringed plover was present but stayed a fair distance from the hides. This common sandpiper came a bit closer.

Today, Wednesday 31st I drove to Nosterfield. 

Lots of birds with young, avocets, black headed gulls, shelducks, mallard, canada and greylag geese. 

I then drove to the quarry part of the reserve where a couple told me about a black tern at Kiln Lake.

I walked down to the lake and saw two birds flying around. After watching them for about 30 minutes I left and drove to Staveley. The car park was quite full, but I managed to find a space.

Lots of flowers

I walked to the west hide where I was able to add 2 birds to my year list. Mandarin and black winged stilt.

The birds were too far away for a decent photograph.

An excellent selection of waders. Black tailed godwits, avocets, little ringed plover, lapwing, black winged stilt, redshanks and greenshank.  A nice end to the month.

Filey Dams

 Granddaughters time at university is nearly over, where has 2 years gone! So it is now time to start bringing home all the things that she has acquired and today I went to get another car boot full.

I managed a trip to Filey Dams as well.

bluebells in the wood

A nice sunny day, but still a cool breeze. Common sandpipers were present

a long staying pink footed goose

whilst it was preening it stretched its wings, which looked ok, so I presumed it could fly, so why it is still here?

I also visited East Lea

Lots of greylag geese

a coot was still on a nest

Lots of yellow flag

which always remind me of holidays on Shetland, especially Foula.

Swan time at Blacktoft

 After completing the H&S checks at Fairburn and St.Aidans I went to Blacktoft to help Stu. You may have seen the post about a pair of mute swans having 9 cygnets. 2 other pairs of swans also had cygnets and on Thursday the 18th of May all three families met in the ditch and a skirmish broke out. The end result of which was that one of the swan families that had 9 cygnets now has 10, and a couple of cygnets were in the ditch on their own.

Later in the day 2 adult swans appeared in the ditch, so it looks as if it could be happy families again.

Marsh harries put on a wonderful display, one male often came close to the 1st hide much to the delight of photographers.

A bittern was seen in flight from Singleton and Marshland. One lady on her first visit to the reserve wanted to see bittern and bearded tit, a tall order. She was in Marshland hide at the right time and saw both birds. 

This adult grey heron was busy fishing just outside Marshland Hide.

this young heron flew onto the lagoon so the adult left.

Sedge warblers were singing and then doing their display flight back into the reeds, a pleasant day to be on the reserve.

Gronant Beach

 On our way back home from Llandudno we called in at Gronant Beach, As we approached the roped off area, we were surprised that we could not hear any noise from the tern colony. The noise from the tern colony at Cemlyn Bay could be heard a long way off.

We heard the call of little terns and saw a couple flying into the nesting area, followed a few minutes later by another 3 terns, and that was it, no more sound or sightings of terns. We scanned the nesting area and saw a couple of oystercatchers and a single ringed plover. We assumed that we were too early in the season for the majority of the terns.

On our way back to the car park we had excellent views of a skylark.

A pleasant way to end our trip with 86 birds on our trip list.

RSPB Conwy and the Great Orme.

 

We arrived just after 9am and were pleased to be able to walk around the reserve in sunshine and no sign of rain. Not as many birds on the reserve as I was hoping for. I ended up with 39 birds on my list, but no new birds for the trip. Very few swallows and sand martins about but we had excellent views of swifts flying over head and saw house martins collecting mud from the estuary. Only 2 waders, a single redshank and a single curlew on the estuary. We heard several warblers but they were not very visible.

High tide was not until 1715, just after the reserve closes so we had lunch and then drove to the Great Orme.

We walked around the perimeter of the farm and saw several butterflies, none of which stopped long enough for a picture. Ravens were busy feeding and 4 choughs flew over, On the limestone pavement we had good views of wheater, linnet, meadow pipit and a song thrush. We had a brief glimpse of a brown bird of prey been chased by crows, but we were not able to say for certain that it was a merlin.

77 birds so far, with just one more stop on the way home on Saturday at Gronant Beach to see the little terns.

Holyhead, RSPB South Stack and Cemlyn Bay.

 Day 2 of our trip. First stop was the harbour at Holyhead where we managed to find a single black guillemot. There was a fine drizzle by the time that we reached South Stack. We walked towards the lighthouse where we saw lots of razorbills and guillemots and a single puffin. On the way back to the visitor centre we had amazing views of chough.

Then a wheatear

Fulmar, gannet, shag, raven and stonechat were also seen. Next stop Cemlyn Bay.

Common, arctic and sandwich terns. Another birder had seen a roseate tern, but the terns kept taking to the air which made scanning for different birds difficult.. Mallard, red breasted merganser, pied wagtail, meadow pipit, linnet, goldfinch, blackbird and dunlin were also seen, but we could not locate yellow wagtails, we also decided not to go looking for the american golden plover as it was starting to thunder. 

RSPB Burton Mere

 

A wet, but pleasant start to our trip to North Wales and Anglesey. We all met at RSPB Burton Mere and after lunch we explored the reserve.

Lots of black tailed godwits, including this one.

The bird was limping as it walked along probing in the mud for food. Later on we came across the same bird

its left leg appears to be pointing the wrong way!

Lots of warblers about, cetti's, willow, blackcap and chiffchaff could be heard singing but remained out of view. A few brief glimpses of sedge warbler, but this reed warbler was more obliging.

several pairs of avocets

a family of canada geese out for a stroll along one of the footpaths

and a pair of ruddy shelducks on the mere

51 birds seen and 4 heard. Anglesey tomorrow.

In between the rain showers

 

This was the my view from the first hide at Bank Island.

2 oystercatchers, a pair of gadwall and shoveler were the only birds I could see. Just as the first rain shower started I moved to the second hide.

The water level is slowly going down, just like at North Duffield Carrs. Coots, mute swans, greylag and canada geese, shelduck, teal, mallard, gadwall and little grebe were all busy feeding. As the rain got heavier I was hoping it might bring swifts etc a bit lower but the only new bird was a tern. I could not see clearly enough to be able to identify it, and it did not stay long.

This willow warbler was sheltering in the hedge.

I decided that I would go home once the rain stopped, so I packed up my equipment and left the hide.

Just outside the hide I saw this orange tipped butterfly, so I quickly unpacked my camera. Not a brilliant shot as I was balancing things while trying to focus.

Luckily I did not put my camera away as a barn owl flew past

So I started to walk towards the first hide a lot quicker, when I came across these whitethroats

I quickly got into the hide and was looking for the barn owl when this linnet landed in a bush next to the hide

Now, where is the barn owl, blimey it is right in front of me!

I then watched it as it slowly flew around the scrape looking for prey.

Then this buzzard appeared

As the barn owl approached the buzzard, they had a bit of a scrap and I did not see either bird again. Time to go home again, and on my way back to car I noticed lots of milk maids

3 g's at Potter Brompton Carr

 

After delivering some urgently needed medication to my eldest granddaughter in Scarboro, I went to Filey Dams and had lunch. On the way home I called in at Potter Brompton Carr. You might just see the water in the middle of the picture.

I joined another birder who was looking for wood sandpiper. Neither of us could see them but I added to my year list

garganey

greenshank

grey plover.

Over 50 ruff present, some of them in wonderful plumage, but too cold for me to stand out in the cold northern wind.

May Day at Filey Dams

 In between battling the traffic on the A64, to take my granddaughter back to uni, I spent an hour at Filey Dams.

 3 bar tailed godwits, 2 common sandpipers and this male pintail.

He was with a female mallard and about 12 ducklings, all of which looked like mallards to me.

A little grebe was fishing near the East Hide.