More from the last couple of weeks to follow, but first a post dedicated to memorable double lightning strike last week. I've been fortunate to have had a fair amount of time to go birding of late, and I've made the most of it - plenty here on the doorstep in Filey, as well as the usual wanders a little further afield, and it was after (quiet) morning sessions at both Flamborough and Buckton that I returned to Carr Naze for an afternoon seawatch on 22nd.
Wandering along the central path under ashen skies, I bumped into Paul (Scanlan), and we mused on a tantalising whiff of east in the northerly wind; enough to drop something decent in, perhaps? I'd been hoping for an Icterine or a Barred Warbler, maybe a Wryneck or an early Red-backed Shrike, or better still, even a Greenish Warbler... Any would be a class early autumn find here, but the latter are real rarities in Filey, with just two in the last twenty years, both of which I'd been lucky enough to find - the last, six years ago, on an umbellifer right on the edge of the cliff....
I said goodbye to Paul, walked maybe ten paces, and a small, green warbler literally dropped in, right in front of me, onto an umbellifer by the cliff path. Clearly, truly fresh-in, I knew from plenty of (sometimes painful) experience I had perhaps just seconds on it before it bolted over the cliff edge and spirited away, so I went for the camera and rattled off a burst of record shots, but I knew before I'd pulled my finger off the trigger that it was indeed a Greenish Warbler. Bingo!
Predictably, it took a good look around and thought better of a bushless, windswept clifftop, and ducked over the edge; I called Paul back and, after a nervous minute or so, it very generously rematerialised in the Magic Bush, halfway down the slope. Instead of pulling a fast one, however, it was more than happy to feed up after its above-ocean voyage, buzzing between weedy patches and stunted bushes as processions of holidaymakers bundled noisily by.
The following morning and, after a couple of hours of pretty meagre returns, I checked the southern side of Arndale, a wooded ravine on the Country Park. I expected little, especially as it was typically well disturbed by dogwalkers and tourists, but I've had good returns here over the last few years - Dusky Warbler, Red-flanked Bluetail and Marsh Warbler all springing to mind - and it paid off again when I heard the distinctive shweut! of a Greenish. I found the bird in a small stand of trees nearby, and before I had time to wonder if it was yesterday's bird, a second began calling emphatically, just a few metres away....
... ridiculous, but there they were, not just calling to each other, but one even responding with regular bursts of song (see below); more concerned with each other than me, I had a very special ten minutes or so with them before they filtered into the densely-wooded ravine.
Beforehand, then, two Greenish Warblers in ten years seemed like a pretty decent return here; 24 hours later and I'd doubled my tally. Autumn really is the greatest time of year.
That moment when two Greenish Warblers duet with each other.... and one breaks into song! Not what I expected on my #Filey rounds this a.m, but I'll take it 🤩@nybirdnews @BirdGuides @RareBirdAlertUK pic.twitter.com/v2X4eyLE5N
— Mark James Pearson (@Markthebirder) August 23, 2021
