What a (Mig)Week - 10th-18th Oct 2020

Hello, gorgeous - Rustic Bunting, Filey, 14th Oct 

Well, that was a blast. What would, in a pre-pandemic world, have been our local Ringing & Migration Week (Migweek) here on the coast was sadly impossible in its traditional form, but it was a least still very much a period to remember, for all the right reasons - great birding, birds, people, places and experiences. 

Firstly, the success of our virtual 'Mini' Migweek - an online substitute for our physical programme - was wonderful; thanks to the enthusiasm and participation of our partners (Flamborough Bird Obs, Yorkshire Wildlife Trust, RSPB Bempton Cliffs and Yorkshire Coast Nature) we were able to deliver a suite of migration- and birding-themed content, the backbone of which was a series of live online talks.

Talking to the wall and not a live audience is an odd adjustment to make, but we all did our best, and from the reactions of our wider community, it worked - in fact, judging by that reaction (and the fact that it was truly accessible for all, wherever you are), it worked even better than usual in some respects. Huge thanks to my good friend and Mini-Migweek partner in crime Ana for all here hard work. You can still access all the live talks online, for a couple of weeks at least - well worth the watch here.

Pale- and dark-bellied Brents on the move through Filey bay 

Secondly, I spent pretty much every waking hour in the field, either at work or play (or, more often, both). A succession of my Yorkshire Coast Nature Migration Specials were wonderfully timed - migration resolutely did not disappoint, for me or, more importantly, the many lovely clients I've had the pleasure of guiding this week. Flamborough was, as it so often is, the great provider for the Specials; I keep the options open on where to hit within striking distance, and I'm able to improvise accordingly, but it's hard to justify leaving the Great White Cape when it keeps on giving as it has this week. And not just for the YCN tours, either; Rich and I even managed some birding together and had a blast as always.

It wasn't all about the Cape (although it would've been more than enough on its own); I birded the backyard here in Filey, too, for various sessions during the week, and - while it may be harder work in various respects - I struck a uniquely rich vein in a memorable 24 hours midweek.

Rocking-horse faeces (contextually speaking) - a Filey Barred Warbler, 13th Oct 

After deep-cleaning the Saint Catherine's Hospice Shop here in Filey at record speed (volunteering is even more fun when your Mrs is your boss) in the morning, the afternoon of 13th in the Carr Naze / Country Park area was quality. A variety pack of late-autumn migrants included Woodcock, Bramblings and thrushes fresh-in, wildfowl on the move in the shape of Barnacle Geese, Goldeneye, both Dark- and Pale-bellied Brents, Mergansers and more, not one but two Merlins (one in off the sea), and then, fluttering innocuously among a dip-feeding gull flock off the Brigg end, a Grey Phalarope - the first (and perhaps last) of the year here.

Spot the hardcore non-gull - Grey Phalarope, Filey, 13th Oct 

Another kick around the bushes in the Country Park yielded more 'crests and thrushes, and then, munching on rosehips within a Greenfinch flock, a secretive Barred Warbler. No great rarity perhaps, but more of a prize than it should be here, being less than annual and hard to catch up with (and I think only the third I've found here?). With additional Ring Ouzel, SEO and more Bramblings, a very satisfying session...

Red-flanked Bluetail, Flamborough, 18th Oct

... which turned out to be merely the opening act for the headline act the following morning. Finding undisturbed areas that hold migrants here is increasingly difficult in recent times, but a plod over to the Tip - hard to reach presently, and thus unusually peaceful - paid out in spades.....

"Why don't you sit down and I'll come a lot closer?" 

Standing at the gate and scanning the Meadow Pipits feeding in the marshy grass for a scarcer relative revealed not an interesting Anthus, but - better still - an electrifying Emberiza. A dream find, and everything was suddenly, blissfully well with the world. The pipits flushed, the bunting didn't, the sun came out, and we got to know each other very well indeed. Perfect.

Fieldfare - a small part of the cast that made a beautiful mess of my sonogram from the night of the 13th

An exceptional, unforgettable 24 hours on the home patch, right? But there were more wonders to be plundered, sandwiched inbetween those diurnal sessions. I'll provide a full summary of recent results with the overnight recorders soon, but it's fair to say - after some seemingly unbeatable returns a few days previously - the metaphorical bloody doors were blown off on the night of the 13th....

A record-breaking night of nocmig from the study window, completing a crazily productive 24 hours birding here in Filey... 

Back at Flamborough, and the roll-call of wonderful quality and quantity migration continued to grow daily, and then hourly: thrushes, Goldcrests, finches and more arriving en masse, and scarcer visitors for my groups over the week included Red-flanked Bluetail, Dusky Warbler, Red-breasted Flycatcher, Siberian Chiffchaff, Barred Warbler, Firecrest, Yellow-browed Warblers, plus Lapland Buntings, Ring Ouzels, and the always breath-taking spectacle of incoming Short-eared Owls (one dramatically dropping beside us on the clifftop out of a brutal storm).

Hmmmm; maybe karma exists, after all.....

Northern, Rustic and Beautiful

"Hello! I'm rare!" Rustic Bunting, Filey, 14th October 2020 

Occasionally, just occasionally...... the right winds, the right time of year, the right time of day, the right circuit to take, the right place to scan, the right bird to fall upon - and no dogs, noise, people, disturbance, pressure, distractions or other crap. Just a beautiful, accommodating, often-dreamed-of rare bird, waiting to be found, and feeding happily in the sunshine here in Filey. Just occasionally, it really does all comes together.

Raining Birds - House Nocmig, Filey, 10th October 2020

The other night, 10th-11th October, was the beginning of our virtual, 'Mini' Migweek; I was guiding all day and then hosting our first talk soon after, and time was tight - so for once, setting a recorder up on North Cliff wasn't possible and I focused on the events at hand, thinking maybe I'd at least run the first recorder out of the study window after the talk.

   

Which, after a great presentation (thanks Rich!), I almost forgot to set - but a good couple of hours after dusk I remembered, put on its plastic cover and jammed it in the open study window. Scrolling through the sonogram the following evening, it seemed like it was going to be a quiet one; no big deal, after providing true nocmig gold a few nights earlier, picking up a Dotterel gunning over the house. A Grey Plover was about it for much of the night, until, a succession of showers - some light, some heavy - beginning at around 0345hrs, and the first few tseeps of Redwings....

 

....Long story short, a veritable deluge of thrushes ensued, and I had the pleasure of counting more than 900 Redwings and 40-odd Blackbirds in a rain-affected sono-window just a couple of hours long; but, with plenty of the calls almost hidden either through distance, rain, or both, I couldn't leave it there. And so last night I decided to physically listen to the busy few hours of the recording pre-dawn, just to see if I'd missed any.

  

 The results were fantastic, and it turns out there were in fact a minimum of 1109 Redwings and a fantastic 113 Blackbirds, and a host of other flyovers I'd missed by just visually checking - four Moorhens, a Snipe, two Golden Plover, three Song Thrushes and (my first nocmig record of) a Brambling - many hidden in the aural drumming and the visual barcode of the rain.

Shoulda, woulda, coulda

(Photos: Red-flanked Bluetail, Yellow-browed Warbler, Brambling, Barred Warbler and Goldcrests)

Spoiler alert - annoying, privileged bleating to follow, for which I apologise with a  dismissive shrug (this is my little corner for birding indulgences after all). So we should've been on Shetland for the last ten days (actually 27th-7th, when it all really kicked off), specifically Unst, specifically a perfect cottage almost as far north as you can go in the British Isles; a return for the Terriers to this birding paradise that promised much last year, and - without going into too much painful detail - emphatically, overwhelmingly delivered this year. 

If we'd have been there, we'd have been tripping over dream birds, fulfilling lifelong ambitions, and gasping at our perfect timing - a barrage of avian gems at our feet in the most iconic and fitting of landscapes. 

But we're not. Following the advice of, and out of respect for, a section of the local community, we grudgingly opted to cancel this year's trip; hard enough with everything else going on, but the daily and latterly hourly dose of salt rubbed into the wounds by perfect weather systems and perfect birds over these past days has been, well... character-building. 

Just to add plenty of insult to injury, it seems as though most the UK birding scene descended on the islands anyway chasing ticks and treats, meaning our social media feeds have resembled a constant, Dante-esque loop of the 'let's take a look at what you could've won' nose-rubbing at the end of Bullseye.  We even had to cancel our Plan B, which was a holiday cottage on the Northumberland coast opposite Lindisfarne - again, steering clear of the gory details, that would've been a very productive substitute - but alas, also not to be because of virus concerns. 

After various other trips going down the swanny this year and with various other issues to deal with, Shetland very much represented an escape hatch, however brief, and a chance to momentarily forget the shitstorm we're all working through these days. Whether we'll make it to Unst again, who knows, but it would seem unlikely - trying somewhere new rather than trying to claw back what was a clearly exceptional ten days this year is probably a more positive and enjoyable route to go down. 

So yes, I know, there are much worse places to be stuck, I'm very lucky to live here, and I do indeed appreciate all that, as regular readers will know. In that spirit, I birded pretty much constantly over these last ten days, hoping that karma might deliver a special something to make for a happy ending; sadly, karma had other ideas, but there was lots of enjoyable birding to be had, a few highlights of which are posted here. 

Here's to a safe, healthy and happy rest-of-autumn. 

Killingholme, 8th October 2020

 

A long but engaging day on the south bank of the Humber, where we're resuming our surveys throughout the autumn and winter (having resumed those on the north side, at Paull, last month). Over the bridge early this morning between walls of rain and juggernauts; back over the bridge this evening as the sky glowed crimson and the rush hour ebbed. Inbetween? Four figures of Black-tailed Godwits (above), hundreds of Dunlins, Avocets (below), Redshank, Lapwing and Teal, lots of Curlew, Snipe, Knot and other waterbirds, plus close-up Marsh Harrier (below) and lots of Chiffys (bottom) and Redwings in the scrub along river. It's good to be back.

Prrr-sistence is Fertile - Nocmig Dotterel, 7th Oct 2020

A quick one to celebrate these three rare and beautiful little prrrrs that almost escaped detection as I sleepily analysed my overnight nocmig recording before falling into bed last night.....    

In between the residual aural distractions that throw shapes all over the sonogram, and with my eyes rapidly closing, there they were - the diagnostic, tell-tale calls of a (Eurasian) Dotterel at 0013hrs! I've had many a nocmig reward for my efforts so far, but this is perhaps the sweetest to date - a species that is only recorded every few years here in Filey, and one which made me work hard for it. Satisfaction guaranteed....

Here's one I made earlier (Flamborough, 2018) 

Talking of Nocmig, how about a free online talk - as part of our virtual, 'Mini' Migweek (10th-18th Oct) - explaining the why, what, where, how and when of nocturnal migration recording? Not a problem - see here for details of this and many more free virtual treats this coming week!

Flamborough, 4th October 2020

Red-flanked Bluetail, Old Fall 

A mighty fine, bird-filled ten hours straight in the field at Flamborough with comrade Rich involving hundreds of tomato-soup-stained Robins, heaps of Chiffys and Goldcrests, good numbers of Song Thrushes and Redwings, Red-flanked Bluetail, Great Grey Shrike, Redstarts, Spot Flys, a scattering of Yellow-browed Warblers, Firecrest, Ring Ouzels, Crossbills and much more....

(Common) Redstart

 Flash mobs of these ticking timebombs everywhere

Yellow-brow - as iconically autumnal as a curling Sycamore leaf

A very showy Barred Warbler in the bay brambles

Three Scandinavian thrushes side by side - Song Thrush, Ring Ouzel and Redwing

Nocmig Update, August 2020 - Flamborough

The Empire of Darkness expands; no, not the relentless, unstoppable late-stage capitalism neo-liberal apocalypse, but my nocturnal sound-recording stations (considerably more benign, but just as time-consuming, trust me). From a crack in my study window in downtown Filey, to a plastic bucket in a field near the North Cliff in Filey, and now, to a plant pot in a garden in Flamborough village.

Grey Plover

Birds and family are my two main reasons for regularly gunning down the road to Flamborough, and so it seemed like a logical extension to combine the two and begin running another sound recorder in my mom's garden. Logistically speaking this means that, while it's easier to run the two Filey locations, I can record a few nights a week there and analyse the recordings as and when I get the chance.

Despite being 'out' on the Great White Cape, the recording location is actually the most inland of the three, being a full 2km from the coast (the house in Filey is 300m, the North Cliff site 200m). Starting on the 10th of the month, I managed 17 nights recording in August, and it didn't take long to reap the rewards.

   

The overwhelming realisation from these early forays is that waders are more than happy to cut off the outer headland, and indeed may often choose the shorter, coast-to-coast, over-the-village route on migration. The species list grew quickly in the first few days, with Ringed, Golden and Grey Plovers, Knot, Common Sandpipers, Redshank and Oystercatchers all registering, a main highlight being some major movements on several nights mid-month.

The best of which involved a surge of waders on the 15th, involving many Oystercatchers, plus Ringed Plovers, Knot and Dunlin - but most impressively, several flocks of Redshank (above), including one very vocal, uncountable group which took a total of 2m 45s to pass over, calling constantly... how many were involved? Here's a short exerpt to illustrate....

 

Turnstones, Little Ringed Plovers, Sanderling, Whimbrel and Curlew were soon added to ever-growing shorebird roll-call, with another surge at the end of the month adding both Bar-tailed and Black-tailed Godwits, with the added bonus of my first nocmig Wood Sandpiper over on the 20th.  

 

It wasn't all about shorebirds (well, with a few exceptions) - Sandwich Terns featured on several nights, as did Black-headed and Great Black-backed Gulls, but the best of the rest was definitely a Tree Pipit (above) on the 14th:- 

   

Pleasing returns and a promising start.....

Nocmig Update, August 2020 - Filey

 

 

 Bar-tailed Godwit on the night of 7th / 8th Aug - one of many decent early autumn nights:

It may not seem like it - blame the pandemic for warping our timeline - but apparently, August was month five of my local nocturnal migration (Nocmig) adventures; the flipside, of course, being that you can also partially blame the pandemic for inspiring my toe-dipping into this addictive and fascinating aspect of my birding experience in the first place. Silver Linings.... 

The following night saw a major Oystercatcher movement throughout (the estimate doubtless a tiny proportion of the birds involved)

As described in the July summary, I've cast the net a little wider lately by running a second recorder, to the north of the town and close to the North Cliff here in Filey; not far away from the house as the White's Thrush flies, but a world away when it comes to circumstance (rural as opposed to urban) and Herring Gull noise pollution (or a lack thereof). From August onwards, it was time to expand the empire further still, with exciting and satisfying results (see next post.....); but for now, here's a summary of Filey's August results.

Sanderlings featured heavily, with a big movement of various flocks on the night of 11th:

   

Filey North Cliff

After starting recording ten days into July (and clocking an encouraging range of early season migration - see here), August was my first full month of nocmig up on the North Cliff here in Filey. My intention was to try and record a few nights each week, but it was entertaining and productive enough to inspire pretty much nightly efforts (only postponed when the weather/wind was especially poor or when circumstances got in the way).

  

Migrating flocks of Turnstones were a feature of several August nights

Happily, the extra effort of dropping off in the evening and picking up in the morning has been very much worthwhile - every night has produced (even in poor conditions), and the species dynamic was, as expected, dominated by numerous shorebird registrations. Of those, highlights included both Bar-tailed and Black-tailed Godwits, Greenshank, two Common and four Green Sandpipers, a handful of Knot, plenty of Turnstones, Redshank and Sanderlings, lots of Dunlins, Whimbrels and Curlews, several Knot, and many, many Oystercatchers ....

Wildfowl were few and far between, but did include the telltale somewhat grumpy mutterings of Gadwall on 31st:

 

Grey Herons featured eight times, four times more than in July and as might be expected with more birds on the move; Black-headed (many), Common (a single) and Great Black-backed (three) added a bit of class to the backdrop of (mercifully polite, irregular) Herring Gulls; and all three species of regularly-occuring Tern made the sonograms, with a healthy 11 Sandwich (insert obvious food-based gag here), four Common and a single Arctic (below) - the first for the site - on 9th.

   

Landbirds were pretty much non-existent, with just the odd errant nocturnal passerine call likely belonging to local birds, but an unexpected bonus came on the night of 16th, when a Short-eared Owl wailed over the recorder - coinciding with an influx of along the coast over the same 48 hours. Result!

Filey Town 

With the gulls at full, tortuous velocity, much of August was always going to be a trying exercise, and many nights were effectively void on account of the wall-to-wall banshee audio-hell. But, with perhaps more effort than could be justified from a mental health perspective, there were little diamonds to be found in the mine (or at least, a few semi-precious stones). 

I tentatively re-opened (figuratively and literally) on the 14th, again by jamming the recorder into the crack of the open study window, pointing up into the ether above the back alley here in the exclusively bricks-and-mortar environs of Filey town. The nightly sonograms were not pretty, and a less committed / more balanced soul would've deleted them at first sight and gone and done something arguably far more productive, but in amongst the haystack, there were needles to be found.

 

Not the impressive roll-call of the spring perhaps, but registations included Sandwich and Common Terns, Water Rail and Coot, Turnstone and Knot, Ringed and Little Ringed Plovers, Curlew and Whimbrel, Common Sandpipers and Redshank - but the highlight, right at the end of the month, was a single Tree Pipit - a much-anticipated (if hardly mega) long-distance passerine migrant and a welcome addition to the scorecard. 

You can find daily counts from my Nocmig efforts on Trektellen here, and my sound recordings on Xeno-Canto here.  

YCN Migration Special - Flamborough, 15th Sep 2020

Red-backed Shrike

It's been a crazy week so far (and will only get busier over the next few) so a quick one to summarise another excellent day's guiding: today, another one of my Yorkshire Coast Nature Autumn Migration Specials - the third of four this week, one of many this season, and not the first (nor no doubt last) that saw Flamborough taking centre stage.

Pied Fly

Three lovely clients, a full, sunny, beautiful day on the outer head, and great wildlife from start to finish. We kicked off with a pristine, accomodating and entertaining juvenile Red-backed Shrike not two minutes from the car park, as Siskins, Redpolls and Meadow Pipits streamed overhead (often vocal, and invisible); we continued along the clifftop, where we serendipitously bumped straight into 20 Bottlenose Dolphins frolicking close inshore before gunning north;

We then sauntered down a deserted Old Fall Hedge, where fresh-in Redstart and Pied Flycatcher gave us an impeccable show; we enjoyed lots more visible migration, with e.g. Grey Plover, Yellow Wagtails, more Siskins and redpolls and hirundines on the move in the blue; and finished up with a leisurely, entertaining seawatch from the clifftop at the fog station.

Arctic Skua, chasing an incoming Greenland Wheatear...

After the dolphin show earlier, it was the turn of Harbour Porpoises to entertain, with many fishing offshore. The stand-out highlight, however, was a unique episode that we watched unfold before us, featuring a pale morph adult Arctic Skua out at sea, skillfully chasing (and almost catching) a passerine in a Hobby-esque fashion....

 

Which survived, and pitched up in front of us

... which turned out to be a spanking Greenland Wheatear - which, after defying a grisly demise over the waves, proceeded to head landward and straight towards us, pitching up literally at our feet and feeding avidly as if nothing happened (and as if it wasn't in the throes of the most epic of songbird migrations between the Neartic, Europe and Africa).

 

Whimbrel

Manxies, lots of summer-plumage Red-throated Divers, Whimbrels, Bar-tailed Godwits and other stuff added to the mix, and it's fair to say, we were all pretty satisfied with the dramas unfolding before us. Magic, as ever!

Bottlenose Dolphins enjoying the sun