A Mega Start on Thanet?

John, Bob, Graeme and I arrived shortly after dawn at Cliftonville. It was still, grey and relatively mild. We walked the short way from the road to the clifftop path, and then found our quarry - a probable Eastern Black Redstart - feeding on the beach below. Even in the gloom, this was one hell of a smart bird species or no species, with just the Black Redstart x Common Redstart hybrid possibility standing in the way (plumage suggests not, but wing formula puts this to bed). Either picking off insects from the seaweed or sallying from the undercliff, it remained faithful to an area of a few hundred yards. There was also a 1st-winter male Northern Wheatear here, one of my latest ever.

Obvious uniform rufous underparts give this Black Redstart a remarkably Redstart feel. Ruling out hybrids is the trickiest part.



throat mottled grey with black as per Dutch Birding for birds in 'paradoxus plumage'

Normally on its own, at one point though it flew up to the clifftop path where it joined 3 'normal' gibraltariensis Black Redstarts (including an adult male). However, at this point, a Woodcock arrived on the grass next to where we were watching. Mike Buckland had seen it 'coming in off', clunking an iron post and hence its appearance of looking half dead, with wings dragged down. Pretty grim stuff, it was picked up where there was a massive, bloody gash to its pectoral. The decent thing was done, and after a successful sea crossing, sad to see such a quality bird meet its demise just as it made landfall.

RIP Woody

After having a typically unhealthy yet satisfying fry up at the nearby cafe, we exited the place and John found a Short-eared Owl flying over and being mobbed by a couple of green monsters (Ring-necked Parakeets). It headed off northeast and over the bay, where the gulls continued the mobbing. Always nice to see a bit of viz mig.

Heading off to nearby Northdown Park, the typical late autumn 'in the mix' of 4 Chiffchaffs (including a couple of brown-looking, non-Siberian yet eastern types) and a few Goldcrests was outdone by a Yellow-browed Warbler that John and I found in trees in the southwest corner of the park near the house. Happy with that, though it didn't show again to Bob or Graeme, we trodged down to King George V Memorial Park to give it a bit of a bash. Not a lot here, except for some more crests and a Chiffchaff. No surprise given the amount of noise created by dog walkers and green monsters. Interesting to see Thanet's scrotes being put to good use - having to wear high viz jackets with not so discrete 'Community Payback' labels on them. They'll probably re-offend and nick some old lady's purse, but at least they picked up some dog shit for their troubles.

Right, so we headed back to get another helping of the star bird. It was still in the same place, and there was a new crowd admiring it. Enjoyed meeting the finder, a lovely chap Barry Hunt, and when things thinned out on the crowd front the bird started performing even better... excellent stuff.

Nice shot to try and get those emarginations... see Dutch Birding Vol 27(3):181

Obvious fringing to flight feathers at times produced a rather discerning panel

With only an hour or so of good light left, we had a fruitless search for a couple of Twite nearby but the remnants of summer theme continued with a couple of Swallows hawking over the clifftop together.

Autumn's Nearly Done

And how do I know that autumn's nearly done with? Not because there is a reduced movement of birds on the patch - it's hard to tell that, even at the best of times, given the patch is nearly devoid of birds even then. But I can tell... and it lies in the amount of time I spend updating a certain website.

Which brings me to an encounter with a man many of us will be eternally grateful to (for finding the Irish Canada Warbler in 2006). I was plodding around Carrahane Strand, County Kerry and bumped into Maurice Hanafin - I've met him here on a couple of occasions on Irish jaunts and we got chatting. Anyways, to cut to the chase, he said he found out bird news these days by using the Netfugl twitter site. He then mentioned that it hadn't been updated for a couple of days with the British news... odd, considering that I'd been in Ireland for a couple of days with no computer access.

Burning the midnight oil... look at all those updates!

And then some people say that with Netfugl news, you get nothing and then all of a sudden a lot of messages come through. Yep, that's because either me or other updaters have been at work or out birding for the day... understandable of course.

This autumn's been really protracted and hard work too, starting with hurricane dumpage in the first ten days of September. Since then, I've tried to whack out each and every Semipalmated Sandpiper through to those dreaded harbingers of winter, Desert Wheatears. And during late September and early October, it took time - Netfugl doesn't just update itself. Even after slogging through those bloody ribeiras, Netfugl got updated each night before the Commodoro call of 'last one up close the lights' (perhaps the most famous saying by a non-birder in WP birding?).  The birds have tailed off now, and nobody's on Corvo for those Dickcissels anyway. The lights are off til next autumn out west for sure.

All I have to do for the next few months is recuperate, hibernate and whack out the odd Black Duck and Forster's Tern here and there...

Brents at the weekend

I wanted to do this post on Sunday, but for some reason the USB connection between my camera and computer stopped working. So I quite rightly had to invest in a card reader. This week's been a struggle to get any birding in before or after work due to the lack of daylight, but a Redwing this morning sailed over as I got out my car in the early morning gloom.

7 of the first 10 that went through

So Sunday was quite a productive afternoon at Cross Ness - John Archer and I had 16 Dark-bellied Brent Geese go through upriver. A flock of 10 at 1.20pm and a further 6 at 2.30pm. There were also a handful of Yellow-legged Gulls on the foreshore - 3 adults, a 2nd-winter and a 1st-winter - and quite a lot of Dunlin and Black-tailed Godwits. The waders are back in strong, so winter has set in.

Up for the chop... the final half dozen

More Azorean Agonising

Back down to earth with a bump today, where local birding around Rotherhithe was diabolical. They've trashed the lake at Burgess Park, and are draining it currently. Though still plenty of gulls around, but I couldn't detect the returning Med Gull just yet. Apart from that, just a couple of Egyptian Geese (regular birds) and 3 Shoveler in Southwark Park.

Having got a big fat Birdforum ban for private comments about the owner of the site, I've turned my attention to Surfbirds and there's a really sensible thread on Dunlin. I've had some correspondence with Niall Keogh about potential hudsonia race birds at Tacumshin this autumn, and in the past birders with an interest in the Azores have pondered on a few birds they've seen out there in the mid-Atlantic.

Which brings me to this bird that was one of two, spotted by Lee Gregory and I in November 2008 at Ribeira Grande, Sao Miguel.

Pale, long legged, long-billed with perhaps more extensive streaking on the flanks than on European birds?

The bill on this individual is massive, with comparatively long-legs, pale toned and just didn't feel like schinzii and arctica birds. Perhaps this bird has more extensive flank streaking but I am not sure whether it could be claimed as a hudsonia candidate (the flank streaking in my eyes is not as extensive or extends far enough back for hudsonia).

Quite a well defined pectoral band

Relatively dark lores

 The key features for hudsonia seem to be a line of dark dots that extend onto the lower flanks, extensively dark lores, a long bill and a solid grey pectoral band (per Stoddart, A. 2007. An apparent Hudsonian Dunlin on the Isles of Scilly. Birding World 20: 464-466).

Ribeira Grande, Sao Miguel November 2008

Headaches from the rock...number 2

There were two 'Herring Gulls' on the airport Thursday 27th October while I was searching the valleys. However, it was not until the next day that we managed to get some flight shots of one of the birds. In the field, this individual had a swarthy feel - with blotching (not streaking) coming through on the nape and breast sides - as well as large size and pale upperparts. All decent starting points to start looking more closely at it as a smithsonianus.

I've done a fair bit of swotting up on the subject this evening, ranging from PAC's adult on Flores in December 2005 in Dutch Birding to the more usual references such as Gulls of the Americas and the standard DB American Herring Gull reference. And also a few internet searches, including the regular bird in Ireland (http://www.birdguides.com/iris/pictures.asp?v=1&f=195040).

primaries show grey pinching into the black tips - 'bayonets' to P7 and P8?

pale underside tongue to P10 long and rectangular

tricky to get exact primaries here due to photo quality. P5 seems to show that black 'W' over both webs...

Headaches from the rock... number one

So Friday morning, the last day on the rock, went something a little bit like this. Get up, have breakfast, see very little in the middle fields, check the dump for interesting gulls to no avail (though some nice shots of atlantis scrapping around with the local cats and a 1cy GBB Gull).

I had a quick look around the tamarisks by the Cape Verde farm, and then a last walk around the airfield. There was little action on the beach, just a couple of Turnstone chilling out as well as a pretty screwed up looking Cory's Shearwater sitting on the runway. It must have had a hard night. So a check over the fields south of the airfield were nice, for old times' sake, but quiet this time around.

And then it was back to this little blighter that has had me perplexed for most of the week. I've been trying to convince myself all week, but I really haven't been too successful in doing so despite some of the others being much keener throughout. It's not a straightforward, obvious individual and I've seen a fair few in my time. One of my claims to fames is locating the Irish bird this autumn on the day for Britain's most famed twitcher Bagpuss, so hear me out guys as I know a bit about what I'm talking about. And I haven't received any emails from the usual scrutinisers, so they're either perplexed or just slagging me off behind my back. So here goes it, with some photos... and a read of Julian Hough's recent paper in Birdwatch. Chandler's Shorebirds book oversimplifies things, so don't go by that.

Much better light here - you can see an orbital ring although it's only pronounced in this light and I'd describe it as buff as opposed to yellow. The legs appear distinctly two-toned, quoted in Van Duivendijk as a pro Semi-p feature. And in this image the lores look real thin, meeting the bill above the gape line. There's a nice obvious orangey bill base.

For sure, palmations between the middle and outer toes - a feature also shown by Ringed Plover. Any pronounced palmation between the inner and middle toe is tenuous... but is it still there?

Dabs at the breast sides, more akin to RP and is that a full breast band?

Are those lores too thick? Compare this image with the 1st one and see how posture gives a different layout of the loral feathering. At this range, there is a orbital ring but it's subtle for sure. And once again, look at those breast sides... though the super thickens at the rear side of the eye.

So, what do I think to this bird? Well I've always found Semipalmated Plovers more obvious than you'd think at places such as Cabo da Praia, so I'm battling with myself because I've not struggled like this before. In certain respects, you need to judge birds such as this on a suite of characteristics for sure, as the little blighter never called despite trying to coax it to do so. References vary - for example, Chandler's book shows a nice photo of a Semip Plover's foot that looks just like this bird, but then incorrectly states that Ringed Plover should have no webbing. Hough states that Ringed Plovers have webbing between outer and middle (like this bird) while Van Duivendijk states 'in Ringed sometimes small semipalmation between inner and middle toe' which in my eyes this bird doesn't appear to show.

So scratching my head still - which I really shouldn't be with the prolonged, close views of this lone bird - I headed to have a scan of the roosting gulls and walked straight into another headache... but it's getting late so I'll leave you with a couple of shots and the commentary will come later. However, upon doing a bit of research over and above what I was already familiar with, this looks quite decent for an adult smithsonianus in my humble opinion.

And after all this tricky business, it was time for me to spread my wings and fly off the rock for another year. Thoroughly enjoyed my time here as always, good to see Manuel and Katt and especially had a quality time with my Dutch buddy Arthur Geilvoet - let's not leave it another 8 years mate.

The Last Full Shift

Today started off, and finished, rather misty with a brisk SSW wind. It was to be the last full day of birders being present on Corvo for autumn 2011 so thought I'd give it a good bash.

After a quick walk around the village in the half light, where the highlight was a White Wagtail seen by Vegard, we wandered to the harbour where the plover from a couple of days ago was still present. Not the most obvious Semi-p(?) I've seen by a long stretch but seemingly is one, with that eye-ring, the lores having a whitish area below the gape and those palmations (obvious between mid and outer toes). More research needed, and it played on my mind right the way up the rock to the other side near the lighthouse.

We got a taxi up to Lighthouse Valley, cutting through all the murk in the middle of the island, and were greeted with more murk and a strongish wind in this exposed valley. Had a good bash at things, but just the usuals. Reminds me a lot of Nanjizzal in Cornwall, so was just waiting for a nice empid to fly out... but it never did. When things got too much, we all headed back along the road and took the track down towards the old whale house - in old times, there used to be people stationed there that would send flares out to boats offshore when they spotted whales.

I'd never been down this way, so lost my bearings a little bit - due to the fog - and that meant we were all scrambling around like goats unnecessarily. But when things cleared, there was Cantinho down below so dropping two fields down from the whale house - BANG!! - yankee action once again. As I rounded a hydrangea hedge and dropped into the next field, there was a lovely Common Yellowthroat nobbing around in front of me. I shouted to the troops, Arthur standing next to me anyway, and all were able to get views of this 1st-winter female before it disappeared into the abyss. We stood around for the best part of an hour, but there was no further sign and it was time to try and get amongst some more yanks with just the a'noon remaining for autumn 2011 in Corvo's valleys!

We had an entertaining climb down Cantinho, scrambling around once again like goats and making friends with the many trees as we clung on alond the slippery slopes. There were, alas, no yanks though the hope was always there for a nice Nearctic wood warbler. I had a quick look in the bottom of Cancelas, but it was too blowy and I had my fall of the day... grabbing hold of a not so solid rock!

Back on the road, there was a bit of action in the bottom of Fojo and it wasn't long before I picked up a bright yellow/orange bird - the Summer Tanager was once again in the original spot where I saw it on Monday, and where it was found on Sunday by David Monticelli and co. Rather bizarre that it was back here again, after Arthur and I had a Summer Tanager half a mile or so away yesterday. The rest of the day was spent feeling rare in Poco de Agua and Do Vinte, but those rares didn't develop and that was it valley wise for 2011. There's always next year.

When I got down to the village, Arthur had photographed a couple of adult 'Herring Gulls' on the airfield that look interesting to say the least, so perhaps they'll be around tomorrow? We had out last supper in the restaurant by the windmill; survived the food here for another year... just. And then with the supermarket open between 9-11pm, had to wait 10-15 minutes to purchase a couple of cans of Diet Coke while the queue moved tediously slowly. Never thought I'd say it, but bring on Tesco.