A Birding Later On

We didn't bother going out for New Years Eve - instead we spent a great night in playing a few board games and various Wii and Playstation challenges with the kids until the early hours. For some unknown reason I opted to drink Gin + fresh orange for the night, and I eventually fell into bed at around 02:45.

I had absolutely no intention of getting up this morning for a birding start, but when I eventually surfaced I could see that it was a superb crisp and cold bright day so I decided to head out to Eyebrook Res for the afternoon. Rutland Water would have been a better birding experience, but I knew it would be awash with elderly punters and wankers.

En route along the A47, I thoroughly enjoyed a superb Red Kite overhead and several Buzzards in the clear bright sky. Arriving at EBR, it was clear that a fair number of the elderly punters and wankers had spilled over, however I headed directly to the inflow bridge and parked up. I decided to leave the car there and uncharacteristically walk around with bins and scope.

Over the next couple of relaxing hours I managed to see c45 species including most of the common wildfowl and gulls, with highlights being the drake Green-winged Teal, a drake and 2 female Goosander, a couple of Redshanks, a few Snipe and Dunlin, a Little Egret, a few Tree Sparrows and a smart drake Bullfinch.

It was bloody freezing cold, so I was extremely pleased that one of my Christmas gifts were being put to good use - a pair of SealSkinz socks which kept my toes warm even when my gloved fingers were about to fall off.

By the time I left the light was starting to fade but I made a quick stop at the regular tree and picked out a Little Owl sitting out on an exposed branch - a great end to the birding afternoon.

2010 - International Year of Biodiversity

HAPPY NEW YEAR! Here's to a bird and moth filled year for all.

I've already had a Blackbird alarm calling and a Robin singing at 00:05 whilst out watching fireworks and lanterns over the garden.


Apparently, 2010 has been declared as the UN International Year of Biodiversity ..



Hopefully that doesn't mean a year of hollow pledges and meaningless treaties followed by more decades of unsustainably raping the environment .....

Taw Estuary

Nipped out for a very pleasant walk around the Isley Marsh reserve on the Taw Estuary this morning. This reserve is immediately opposite Lower Yelland Farm where there were five Cattle Egrets yesterday. Today, there were precisely zero Cattle Egrets around the area (or at least I didn't see any).


The massive sandy/muddy expanse that is the Taw Estuary (click for a bigger expanse). The tide was out, so all of the waders and wildfowl were out of decent photographic range.

I can't remember the last time I visited this site and didn't see Spoonbills, and today was no exception. There were initially three feeding out in the middle of the estuary, later the group had grown to four roosting on the edge of the saltmarsh.


Four distant sleeping Spoonbills - honestly.

Waders included 100s of Curlews, 1000s of Lapwings, loads of Oystercatchers and Turnstones, a few Redshank and a couple of Grey Plovers. There were also plenty of Shelduck, Teal and Wigeon, and a couple of Black-necked Grebes.

At least five Little Egrets were knocking about, and a smart Kingfisher, flyover Raven, foraging Rock Pipits and a couple of Stonechats were nice to see.


This Sonechat was out of frame a millisecond later.

Garden Game

Even though we are not too far from farmland, living in a suburban Close with little in the way of mature trees and decent habitat around the estate, you have modest expectations of what will turn up in your garden. Gamebirds were not high on the 'what will be the next new species' list. A couple of months ago though, I was not impressed when a pair of Red-legged Partridges ran down the street just past our Close as I drove off - I was only a few yards away from adding them to the list.

Just in time for Christmas, today when I got home from work I was amazed to see a stupid fat garden tick Pheasant rise up from under my feeders and flap unceremoniously onto the neighbours garage roof. It soon came back to carry on feeding, so I grabbed a few shots.


It was tempting to find something to catch it with for an alternative Christmas dinner ...




Prime birding habitat.

I have a collection of feeders on our front cherry tree - easier to fill and watch than the rear garden. This year, the Goldfinches are almost constantly present with much fewer Greenfinches than usual. I like Goldfinches, but they are messy buggers with the sunflower hearts - dropping as many as they eat which no doubt suited the Pheasant.

I've also seen Chaffinches actually using the feeders this year - they are usually too crap and just flit half-arsedly near it for a couple of seconds before strutting around on the floor again.


Merry Christmas to everyone - I'll be thinking of your peaceful day whilst contending with excited children, conflicting TV preferences and stuffing a bird ....

After the excesses, we'll be heading down to Devon for a few days so hopefully some coastal birding to write about early next week.

X-Factor Killed In Name of Facebook

In a move that has been claimed as "a victory for the independent thinker", American rock act Rage Against The Machine have soared to the top of the UK charts following a campaign on a social networking site, demoting the rightful owner of the coveted Christmas spot to Number Two.

Rage Against The Machine are notorious for their hard-hitting political lyrics and ethos, and their aggressive cross-over rock/rap style with liberal use of expletives. Never ones to tow the corporate line, they first started releasing their vitriolic message through the Epic label (part of CBS Recordings, which in turn became part of the huge billion-dollar Sony Music Corporation) in 1992. Meanwhile their bitter chart-topping rival, Joe McElderry, who was not born when Rage first hit the scene, is a nice boy from South Shields with white teeth.

The campaign on Facebook, a multi-million dollar private internet company, was designed to prevent the X-Factor Winning Song from inevitably achieving the Christmas high-light.

Brian Washed, from Middlesex, speaking on behalf of the 500000 people who downloaded 'Killing In The Name' in support of the campaign, said "This is serious stuff! Me and everyone else who downloaded it from i-Tunes have sent a very clear message to that smug high-waisted twat that we will not pander to the whim of others and just buy stuff that we are told to like. We are free-thinking people who refuse to comply and act like sheep. To be honest the Rage song is a bit shit and not really my taste at all, I prefer lushy ballads and stuff by George Micheal, but I am an individual and refuse to pander to the corporate bastards at Sony".

When asked for his views, Joe said "Well, I canna complain like cos being a Number Two is still good and me Mam is dead proud an that, and anyways that Cheryl is a great shag and I'm just soo happy an over the moon an that".

When asked for his view on being Number One in the UK Popular Music charts, guitarist Tom Morrello said "F*** off you fu**ing fu*ker!"


An early shot of Rage Aganist The Machine at a 'Stop Racism and Bigotry' festival.


Simon Cowell (left) shows which thumb put the big smile on Joe's face (right)


Cheryl Cole with a typical corporate lap-dog

Fox eats Owl

Good to get back to winning ways after back-to-back defeats. Couldn't have picked a better team to bounce back against (sure the Drunkbirder won't agree ...)



Despite the defeats, City are still in the top six.
Wednesday are now in the bottom 3. Shame.

This week, I have mostly been listening to ..

Given that I was only 9 when it was released, it was some time afterwards that I heard it through (though I had been aware of the nonsense surrounding the band from the news and had heard the singles).

It is surely the most directly relevant album title ever, and the only way to listen to it is to put the hype and bollocks (and Bill Grundy incident) aside and pretend you have no idea who they were. Just accept it for what it is - a superb aural assault. Best played with the volume at ear-bleeding levels.

My favourite track is this (with the classic lyric at 1:58):

Garden Moth Stats 2009

I've been ridiculously busy at work over the last couple of weeks, including both Saturdays, and otherwise it's been either dark or shitty weather. Consequently nothing ventured and nothing seen!

Today I could have got out, but a very welcome late lie-in and generally doing nothing much seemed preferable. One thing I did do was mess about with my garden moth records on MapMate. Aside from a few Winter Moths, I'm unlikely to record anything else here this year so I did some provisional basic analysis. You'll need to click on the tables to be able to read them!

2009 Total as at 29/11/2009 is 9763 individuals/344 species, versus 9764 individuals/343 species in 2008. I kid you not - I couldn't have contrived a closer comparison.

There were 68 species recorded in 2008 that I have not seen here in 2009. Of these, the 25 'commonest' with 10 or more records over the years are:


In 2009, I have added 13 species (9 micros, 4 macros) to the garden list:


Comparison of the top 20 macros and micros to last year shows a few gainers and losers.

For the macros, the biggest positive change was for Gold Spot - 29 records/117 individuals versus 10 records/19 individuals in 2008. The biggest drop was for Green Carpet - 31 records/64 individuals versus 41 records/139 individuals in 2008.


For the micros, the biggest positive change was for Crambus pascuella - 20 records/60 individuals versus 7 records/8 individuals in 2008. The biggest drop was for Epinotia nisella - 17 records/30 individuals versus 27 records/116 individuals in 2008.


So - what does this all mean?

Actually - nothing. Comparison of any year to the previous one always shows changes one way or another. I now have ten years of garden trapping data though so I will be doing some proper analysis of certain species at some point during the winter.

Out of Here!

As the reality show based in the jungle wilds of Parliament draws toward the final stages, one of the main contestants starts to crack and faces eviction. Gordon Brown (aka GB, Gordy, Browny, Browny Gordy, Twat) has riled fellow contestants with offensive hand gestures:


"You're a wanker Cameron"

It had all started so well, with GB seeing off one of his main rivals in an early episode:


The Bush-Fucker Trial

More recently though, things have been getting harder to swallow for Gordy:


Talking bollocks is easier than eating them.


Browny explains just how big, round and squidgy the bollocks were.

As the end nears, Browny Gordy has taken to seeking advice from more enlightened fellows:

Tell me how taxation works again Mr (Leicester) Lama?

Despite the setbacks, Twat looks set to stay in the jungle to the bitter end, seeing of fellow contestants on the way:

Cheerio Bone-on

Tits, Nuts & Painted Lady

There - that post title should attract a few inadvertent hits.

Mostly today I have moping about the house feeling sorry for myself with a massive banging headache. I wouldn't mind if alcohol had been involved, but it wasn't. So instead of driving off somewhere to enjoy the wildlife like I should have done, I had to make do with watching the locals on my various feeders. However I managed to miss the best bird of the day with the camera - a superb male Great Spotted Woodpecker (garden rarity) briefly landed in our tree and had a look at the nuts before heading off.


Oriental Laughing Collared Dove



Greenfinches


Goldfinch


Great Tit


Tit on my seed


Tit on my nuts


Tit on the neighbour's plums

Aside from the nice tit action, I was most surprised to see this nectaring on cultivated heather:



Painted Lady

Pretty sure I've never seen one this late in the year before.

Surprise

Right at the end of October, I found a fairly unimpressive green caterpillar after dark feeding on what remained of our lavender. Other than it obviously being a noctuid, I had no idea what species it was and boxed it for a closer look the next day. Next day came and it had abandoned the food plant and spun-up in the kitchen roll, so I thought no more about it.

Tonight I happened to notice that a moth had already emerged - that's just less than two weeks, and I can't be certain it didn't emerge earlier in the week. Anyway, it was a Silver Y - a completely unexpected addition to the garden breeding lepidoptera list that I haven't compiled.

Reading Porter, it does indicate that the its normal 8-week egg to adult life-cycle can be dramatically compressed when confined indoors.


The phone rang, and the lady of the house answered -
"Hello, is that Mrs Smith?"
"Yes, Mrs Smith speaking, who's calling?"
"Mrs Smith, this is Dr Jones from the hospital. I'm afraid I'm calling with some terrible news from your husband's recent exploratory checks"
"On no - what's wrong?"
"Well, the trouble is Mrs Smith that we have two sets of results for a Mr Smith and we cannot be sure which results are your husband's - but it's not good either way"
"Well - what is the news?"
"Your husband either has chronic Alzheimer's or Syphilis"
"Oh my God - what do we do now?"
"We suggest you drive your husband into town this evening and leave him there. If he finds his way home, don't ever sleep with him again!"

This week, I have mostly been listening to ..

A rather obscure but brilliant 1990 collaboration between Anne Dudley (Art of Noise etc) and Jaz Coleman (Killing Joke etc). I bought this on impulse years ago whilst looking for something else back in the day when you still visited record shops regularly and 'downloading' was simply a euphemism for taking a shit.

It is, I think, a superb piece of work - essentially an Arabic / Middle-Eastern instrumental with both classic orchestral and regional instruments along with synths and electronics.



For a change, I thought I'd shamelessly abuse You Tube by uploading a slideshow of some of my photos set to a track from this great work. If the photos are crap, or the slide animation is jumpy/doesn't work, just close your eyes and turn the volume up - the main thing is the music. The track is called Habebe.

Stuffing Springboks

I am not a particularly big follower of Rugby, either code - football is my main sporting interest. However I do like to watch the RU Six Nations Championships and World Cup, and like to see the local Leicester Tigers doing well.

Through work, I often go to home games at Welford Road with the mandatory hospitality including excessive free alcohol intake, a great meal and of course the game. Last night was one such occasion - with the difference being that it wasn't a league or cup game, this was Leicester Tigers v South Africa ..... and we won!



It was an immense game with a sell-out 24K crowd. Amorosino's first half try was stunning, and Tigers put in a truly fantastic performance.

The six pre and a few more post match pints of Guinness helped to mark the occasion, and this morning I have just about lost my voice whilst having a massive headache.

On this day, 05/11/1993

Sixteen years ago today - how time flies!

A very early start saw me and John Hackett heading down to the Swanage area in Dorset. It was only my third twitch, but I was fully aware of the significance of the enigmatic bird we were hoping to see. By 08:00 we were on site at Winspit with a sizeable crowd despite the bird having been found on 30th October. Before long, there it was ..... Red-flanked Bluetail. See here for photos.

At the time this was a massive rarity with virtually all of the previous records being in the northern Isles (like one trapped on Fair Isle on 16/09/1993). It was certainly the first widely twitchable bird, and prior to 1993 there had only been 11 records and I believe this was the first year that two were recorded in the same year.

Of course in time it turned out to be a forerunner of many more accessible birds in subsequent years, rather than being the superb blocker we thought it would be. In fact I saw another one in Norfolk in 1994. Nevertheless, I can still visualise the scene when my first Bluetail popped into view - absolutely fecking awesome!

More SEO Action

I went back to Cossington late this afternoon for another Short-eared Owl fix. Along with Alan Rayfield and a couple of others, we had to wait until quite late before they appeared although it was clearer and brighter than on Friday with a full moon rising.

The first to appear was the paler of the two, which very nicely perched up on a very close post and could be clearly heard calling. I was glad I took the scope to get excellent views of the perched bird. After a few minutes it flew across the track and perched up right at the top of a bare spindly tree where it was very briefly mobbed by a Kestrel. From nowhere a darker individual appeared and the two were then both flying around together for a few minutes, again calling. The darker bird gave us superb close views and flew directly over us at one point. Superb stuff.

Otherwise a single Barn Owl put in a very brief appearance, being constantly mobbed by Magpies as it tried to hunt, and up to 8 Grey Herons were knocking about the meadow and in surrounding trees.