Grimley bonus visit on trials night

Bar-tailed Godwit

 Drake Garganey

Bar-tailed Godwit

 Worcester City centre

Common Tern

You never know with Grimley how close the species will be & my tripod clip is being really problematic making it unusable (new clips on order from the Birders Store). On this occasion I didn’t have anything to worry about as the Hippo pool was where all the action was happening. Firstly a Bar-tailed Godwit was feeding pretty close to the causeway and a male Garganey was at the back of the pool looking splendid. Very jealous we have never had a stonking male like this at the pits. Four Common terns were buzzing about feeding, the downside dogs off the lead was disturbing the birds. Dogs love being off the lead, I think we can all understand that, but letting your dog roam freely with so many wild birds in location with no control as owners caught up on local gossip shows a real lack of understanding & responsibility.

Additional  sightings included a Ringed Plover, Little Ringed Plover, 3 Swifts plus the normal regular species. I saw another 4 Swifts in the city centre, it seemed there was a huge influx in the country during the day.

Besston Isbelline Shrike - Norfolk October Day Trip (Part 1)

Isbelline Shrike - Chris Boyd

Isbelline Shrike - Chris Boyd

Isbelline Shrike -

Isbelline Shrike - Stephen Whayman

Video - The ID Bird Company

With the winds looking favourable I hit the road early on Friday at 4.30am to the East coast. First stop was Beeston Common which would be my furthest point from home before working back along the coast. The journey took around 3 ¼ hours, a couple of podcasts & some new music certainly helped. 

Beeston is near Sheringham and a layby at the foot of the common was a perfect place to park. Not knowing where to head didn’t matter as soon as I was on the common I could see my first target bird an Isbelline Shrike perched to my right on a Hawthorn Bush. The light was very poor but the handful of birders got some fantastic views. 

Digiscoping was very difficult but thankfully Stephen Whayman (Website whayman.com Flickr Stephen Whayman2015)& Chris Boyd (Twitter ChrisDipperBoyd) kindly provided me with some fantastic shots for the blog of both the Shrike & Pipit. 

Isbelline Shrikes are related to Turkestan Strike and breed in Mongolia and West China. The bird was around 200 metres away during my time observing and could be seen catching bees and flies.

Ross's Gull is star attraction at Topsham

 Black Tailed Godwits

 Greenshanks

 Little Egret

 Estuary

 RSPB Bowling Green viewpoint

Ross's Gull

Ten days off work allowed me to grab a bit of birding time ahead of the youngest lads festival of cricket at Kings College, Taunton. I'd booked a pelagic sea cruise on the Sunday so I broke up the journey with a Devon stay over. This gave me chance to visit the excellent RSPB Bowling Green Marsh in Topsham.

I arrived a couple hours after high tide due to some serious M5 traffic but there were still large numbers of Black-Tailed Godwits and an endless number of Little Egrets. The reserves marsh was currently being replaced so viewing was limited so I headed down to the viewing platform that looked over the River Clyst. The estuary held good numbers of Greenshank, Whimbrel and Curlews.

I then headed round the strangely named "Goats path" to the mouth of the River Axe before scanning for the reported Ross's Gull. Without any luck I continued to work up river until I located the bird sat under the M5 bridge, a good 40 minute walk. This little gem was very similar to a Little Gull in size and was certainly well off course considering it should be in north America or the arctic. A lifer for me and a great start to the weekend.