A veritable feast for the eyes was had last week, when I ventured down to Ferrybridge and Portland again. I'd studied the forecast, and everywhere was going to be shrouded in fog until late morning, except the Portland peninsula, and being a habitual early riser that decided me where I was going... More birds in flight practise (nice big slow gulls!) ID practise with combinations of Larks and Pipits, the chance of Birds of Prey... what more could you want.... well.... as it turned out....late in the trip... 2 new to me birds!!
Before we start, this is one of my long trips out, so I hope you enjoy your snacks!!
First up, in the car park....
Still in the car park
And still...
still.....
Haven't made it out of the car park yet!
Phew.... what a start... and that didn't include some rubbish cormorant and corvid shots!
Out along the "lagoon" were lots of waders, Dunlin, Sanderling, Ringed Plover to name a few
Fairly distantly a regular fracas kept kicking off, with a number of gulls harassing a number of cormorants
Thanks again to those in the ID querying thread of this gull, I think the final thought was it's a Common Gull
My practise of photographing everything that moves sometimes pays off, as I think this may be a Knot?
As an indication of the distances around the Fleet...
Crops down to
Luckily it wasn't just in the car park, or in the middle of the sea the Cormorants appeared (not sure I've seen so many in one place before)
Not sure if this Oystercatcher used a stone as a tool... or if it caught two different molluscs...
Well... you know how Stonechats tend to flit along perch to perch, often as a pair..... well imagine my surprise when Mr Stonechat was doing it with Mrs Greenfinch!! They followed each other on 3 or 4 of those concrete bollards, dropping to the grass and then back to the bollard top... very odd!
I'd crossed over the road, and was looking out into Portland Harbour (Great Northern Diver, and both Black and Red Necked Grebes has been spotted in the last few days) and the cliffs the far side of Weymouth Bay caught my eye, or more accurately... the fog along the top
Back over the road and I did something I've not done since I was a kid... climbed to the top of Chesil Bank (I won't be doing it again any time soon...pebbles are a right b*gger to walk up lol)
First up, looking along the Fleet
And then the other side of the bay, I guess towards Bridport ish
Back to the car park...
A very fetching poppet Pipit in a skirt
Obviously after such a good couple of hours, I was going to push my luck, so headed up to the Bill full of optimism.
As always...check out the car park, you never know who's lurking about
Moonlighting as one of the Royal Navy Border Patrol
Sparrow bath time!
a Charming tree
This was at the clii top, but periodically a wave would crash in hard enough to send spume up and over, but Waggie didn't seem to mind...he was probably more focussed on the hundreds of little flies there were
The only Robin I saw all morning!
There were a few of these big fellas about
And even more of these not so big fellas!
Now, the first of the two new birds... Purple Sandpiper
And then, lo and behold, just around the corner....new too... Black Redstart
Possibly a third new one (but unlikely) Google lens is quite insistent this is a water pipit?
Flying distantly, a Gannet.... certainly unexpected!
Then heading back to the car park, the elusive Black Redstart again!
So now really deciding to push my luck, I returned to the Fleet, as the tide was a couple of hours different... Sanderling
Turnstone
And finally a Brent Goose, that had been too distant to photograph in the morning
Well, I hope you enjoyed my bird filled morning, and thank you for sticking with it all the way through!!
As always ID's and corrections welcomed
Stay Safe All
Kind regards, Ann
Better bet would be to check out the dorset birds and hampshire birds recent sightings pages dorsetbirds.blogspot.com/ www.goingbirding.co.uk/.../birdnews.asp They're usually updated mid-late evening each day. Hope it helps, and good luck going "loon"y!!
EDIT... If you're North Hampshire maybe have a look at the Wiltshire pages too, Recent Sightings - Wiltshire Ornithological Society | Wiltshire Ornithological Society (wiltshirebirds.co.uk)
Sounds like you may not need the following links, Mattie and PB, but others might be interested. The Great Northern Diver here in the UK is the same bird as the Common Loon in North America, Gavia immer--it is just that the common names differ. www.rspb.org.uk/.../ www.allaboutbirds.org/.../ en.wikipedia.org/.../Common_loon
If the links do not work, enter Loon into the search box of https://www.allaboutbirds.org/ and enter Great Northern Diver into the search box on the RSPB home site, https://www.rspb.org.uk/ and click on the first link shown and search for Common Loon on https://en.wikipedia.org/ . (Apologies that I have not taken the time to learn smart links--sorry!)
Winter sea watching on places like Stag Rock in Northumberland can often produce sightings of our Divers, last winter, last winter we has a White Billed Diver to add to our list. I do think Loon is a horrible name for such a fantastic bird,it sounds like what we used to call folk with mental health problems
Pete
Birding is for everyone no matter how good or bad we are at it,enjoy it while you can
That bird was the result of several cold hours on the Northumberland coast, a lifer for me so worth the freezing fingers and toes I think the White Billed is also known as a Yellow Billed. Bloth Red and Black Throated Divers can be found in N W Scotland where they breed in small numbers.