Eastern Black Restart on Tewkesbury Abbey

Views to the highest point

A real stonker of a bird

Tewkesbury Abbey - a stunning twitch location

Creeping closer

Closest view but light made photography difficult

A growing audience

Final shot before departure

Saturdays patch visit was once again ruined by the local shoot flushing everything making birding very difficult. Huge numbers of Redwings & Fieldfare were seen so might have a focused session in the orchards next week as you never know what might be in there.

Whilst I was on sports taxi duty in Bromsgrove on Sunday morning I had a call to make me aware that the Black Redstart on Tewksbury Abbey had been re-identified by Gavin Peplow as a Eastern Black Redstart. Once the match had finished (a 11-1 win) I was on way to pick the Squire up to make the 30 minute drive to Tewksbury.

A group of around thirty birders were already watching the bird so we vey quickly managed to see it. Next job was a real scope view to identify the bird before trying to get a few record shots.

The bird was presumed to the be the same bird that was present at Ripple Pits on the afternoon on the 6th December.

All the regular faces were among the increasing groups watching the bird which swelled to around 60 with additional people coming and going. The bird appeared to undertake some large circles starting at the highest point before working its way down to the windows & slate roof before heading towards us when I took distant record shots. Twice the bird entered the grounds of the Abbey and fed in the tree around 25 metres in front of us. It even landed on the fence at one stage.

I found this interesting article about Eastern Black Redstarts however my photo doesn't really support a close analysis as required. The bird was not able to be located the following day at Tewkesbury however the weather was very poor all day. 

http://birdingfrontiers.com/2011/11/21/eastern-black-redstart/