I’m lying in wait!

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Common Terns (Sacha Barbato)
Not long now before the skies become busy with commuting birds and the bushes swell with refueling migrants.
I’ve had two pretty poor overcast mornings over the past couple of days. Will it be a case of – ‘but on the third day…….?

Extra Extra Extremadura

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Some more images from my recent trip to Extremadura. All images copyright of Edo van Uchelen.

Another Wheatear

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Won’t be winning a photographic competitions with this one!
This morning I hit The Scrubs early, pre dawn with a novice birder en tow. I was asked by a friend to take this fella out to introduce him to the world of birding. To be honest, I didn’t fancy it. It was too early in the morning and selfishly, I wanted to be looking for migrants on my own. It was too early to be conversing, scratch that, too early to be teaching someone about birds at 6.30 in the morning.
When I picked up Ed (who lived locally) I was taken by his politeness. When we arrived at The Scrubs I was surprised by his enthusiasm and vigilance. He wasn’t a young man and his enthusiasm was what I would have expected from a kid. He was enthralled when I pointed out a closeby female Great Spotted Woodpecker, delighted when he saw displaying Meadow Pipits parachuting from the sky and mesmerised by his first ever Northern Wheatear.
I actually enjoyed taking Ed around. He thanked me prefusely and vowed to become a Scrubber. I’m pretty sure that in a year’s time Ed will be a great birder. I’ll have to get Ed to start blogging.

The latest Scrubs news

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My inagural digiscoping efforts of a glorious male Northern Wheatear at The Scrubs yesterday using an ill-constructed kit.
I will try to improve!

All Ireland Conference 2011

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TUB on a beach in Donegal c1993 (Rene Pop)
Last night I delivered the key note speech at the RSPB Northern Island and Birdwatch Ireland jointly organised annual conference. It was held at a golf hotel on the outskirts of Belfast. I spoke about urban birding to the assembled masses and including some chatter about Tower 42 and of course, The Scrubs.
I had a great night and everyone was so friendly. My audience were especially appreciative when I proclaimed early on that I considered myself an honorary Irishman who should really be called David O’Lindo!
Before catching my flight back home I did a radio interview with BBC Ulster and was also interviewed on camera by the RSPB chatting about urban birding. Back in London I was giving myself brainache trying to work out how to fix together the digiscoping kit loaned to me by Opticron.
If it took me three days to put together a bird feeder then I stand no chance.

Call to arms

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Great Tit (Russell F Spencer)
My grand fighting talk/pep talk to myself worked, because yesterday I strolled onto The Scrubs and immediately flushed a migratory Woodcock from the playing fields. It was our first ever March bird. A little later a second winter Mediterranean Gull flew over with a bunch of Black-headed Gulls. Now, we have had a wintering bird on and off, but that one was an adult and by the last time it was seen (last month) was sporting a fine black hood.
Finally, whilst checking the grassland to count the numbers of singing Meadow Pipits an exquisitely beautiful summer plumaged Northern Wheatear landed on a Blackthorn bush. Lovely.
I must go now to prepare my speech for the All Ireland Conference in Belfast on Friday, where I will be chatting about the virtues of urban birding. Wish me luck!

Time waits for no one

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Wren with nesting material (Russell F Spencer)
Blink and you will miss it. Spring that is. I always find the transition from winter birding to spring migrant watching difficult. Laziness is the name of the game during the dark months of winter. I get up late and infrequently drag myself down to The Scrubs. Then all of a sudden things start to change. Buds appear, the first bumblebees start gingerly fly around inspecting any orifice that they stumble across and of course, with the change in the weather comes the bird song and migrants.
Well, that’s the running order on paper. Usually, there are several false dawns when the weather seems nice then the next day you die from hyperthermia. Last week we recorded our first Wheatear and since then nothing, apart from several Chiffchaffs. It’s easy to become despondent. You think, oh I’ll just stay in bed this morning, especially as there has been no movement for the past few days. Sods law, the morning that you kip in is the morning when a great migrant touches down on your patch.
I’m not going to fall into my usual trap. I’m going to break my balls (as often quoted in Scorsese’s Goodfellas) and make sure I cover my patch this spring. I want to be there to welcome that magical bird – whatever it may be.

The wanderer returns

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Northern Wheatear (Stephen Daly)
This morning was one of those classic misty occasions when you peer out through the venetians at stupid o’clock and think to yourself, ‘there’s a Wheatear on my patch’. Unfortunately, I couldn’t make it out as I was still tweaking my book and needed the extra hours this morning.
Luckily, one of the Scrubbers made it down to the patch and clocked a fine male in the grassland. I’m out in the morning to see what I can find.

Red Kite delight!

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Red Kite (Jon Osborne)
I have become a recluse. There is no other way of describing it. I haven’t even been birding since returning from Extremadura. The main reason is that despite finishing my book the most arduous part has just started. The tweaking. And boy, the tweaking is driving me mad.
This afternoon, I took a stroll around the block to clear the cobwebs. Within moments I noticed a group of around 12 Carrion Crows cawing and flying purposefully at rooftop level. At first I thought how unusual it was to have seen a group like that in my neighbourhood. Don’t get me wrong, crows are a common sight in my area and there are several breeding pairs dotted around the immediate vicinity. But then it suddenly dawned on me that they were mobbing something. My excitement mounted as a Red Kite suddenly popped over the rooftop with over 20 crows in hot pursuit.
Red Kites are far more regular in London than ever before thanks to the expanding introduced population in Oxfordshire. Even so, it was great to see such an amazing bird of prey so close to my home.

Dirty City Blues

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Dirty City Blues (Alastair Riley)
Life in the city has been cold and grey until today when the sun peeped out momentarily and it was just cold. It’s funny how different you feel when a couple rays bounce of your skin. Recently, I recorded my first non Wood Pigeon on the feeders in my back garden. I use the word ‘garden’ very loosely as my yard is basically a small concrete patio. A pair of Robins worked in tandem trying to chisel off bits of suet, whilst on the floor below a male Blackbird splished and splashed in the ornate birdbath that someone gave me for Christmas about a hundred years ago.
The Spring migrants will be with us shortly and I can’t wait. In fact, I will be lying in wait for them in several locations come April, namely Tower 42, Canary Wharf Estate and of course on my beloved Scrubs.
Perhaps, I might be lucky enough to enjoy a vision similar to the one that my good friend Alastair Riley has painted whilst I patrol the urban wilds of the Canary Wharf Estate. Time will tell.

Visions of Extremadura

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TUB seeking sandgrouse (Godfried Schreur)
Iberian Ibex country at Guijo de Santa Barbara
River Tietar, Monfrague National Park
An old boy
Someone’s abode in Garganta la Olla
The grounds of Hotel Talayuela – Hoopoe, Rock Bunting & Woodlark

Bad Spanish Disco

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Marbled Gecko
Profile shot of the little fella
Imagine the scene; it’s 3am and you’re tired, had three Cava’s too many and you’re being dragged out onto a dancefloor frequented by seems a load of underaged girls along with a selection of older mums and dads. What’s worse, there is a lot of bad dancing going on to Boney M’s Brown Girl In The Ring.
Get the picture? That was the predicament that I found myself in last night/this morning in the historic town of Trujillo, Extremadura. The previous day I had been rejoicing at the sight of many Black-bellied & Pin-tailed Sandgrouse, multitudes of Calandra, Thekla and Crested Larks, Great Spotted Cuckoos, Black Wheatears, Spanish Imperial Eagles and many more goodies including the above featured gecko.
The day then nosedived into the lap of filthy drinking and dirty dancing. Resulting in several of us crawling back to the hotel at some unknown hour only to rise again seemingly minutes later to do the 2.5 hour coach journey to Madrid airport, a journey that was fortunately broken by a pitstop at a reservoir. This body of water provided us with Squacco Herons, a Great White Egret, Little & Great Bitterns, Cetti’s & Fan-tailed Warblers, Purple Swamphens and a performing male Penduline Tit.
Extremadura is twice the size of Wales and is stuffed full of birds. Get yourself out there!

Imperial Eagle Owl

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Black Kite (Neil Kumar)
A special day was had today, as it was the day of a new lifer for me – an Eagle Owl. It was a handsome bird sitting on its nest in a crevice in Montfrague, Extremadura. Most of its head, part of its back and one of its gloriously long ear tufts was visible. It’s a species that I have been chasing around Europe for several years that included scanning the same spot last year with each attempt concluding in a miserable nil points.
We also saw a distant Spanish Imperial Eagle sharing the thermals with a host of Griffons. Every time it faced us the creamy forewings were clearly visible. Aside from the Black and Griffon Vultures we also had a couple Egyptian Vultures, Black Kite, Booted and Bonelli’s Eagles, Peregrine, Common & Lesser Kestrel and Cranes.
Tomorrow we search for sandgrouse.

Capricorn

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Saw my first ever Iberian Ibex today, distantly standing on a boulder on a mountainside. Also saw a singing and displaying Dartford Warbler, singing Rock Buntings, Blue Rock Thrush, Crag Martin, Swallow, House Martin and Dippers.

More updates tomorrow.

Extremadura revisited

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White Stork
I’m back in Extremadura, Spain until Sunday being looked after by the Spanish Tourist Office. Bit knackered after last night waking up on the sofa in front of the TV at 1.30am – I’m sure we’ve all done that before at some point in our lives! I then transferred to bed, but woke up again at 4.30am. Packed my case and was at Gatwick for 8am.
I landed in Madrid at around noon and spent the next three hours with some other birders including Dave Gosney on the road heading for Extremadura. On the way we must have seen at least 30 Buzzards, around 8 Red Kite, 10 Kestrel, 1 Golden Eagle, 1 Griffon Vulture, countless migrating Cranes and Greylags as well as plenty of Spotless Starlings.
Staying at the plush Talayuela Golf Hotel and an afternoon stroll around the grounds resulted in a fly over Siskin, plus 2 Woodlark, 2 Rock Bunting, at least 3 Hoopoes plus the usual assortment of finches that included Serins.

It’s all over now!

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My old notebook (Russell F Spencer)
After spending what seemed like an eternity wading through memories I’ve finally finished incorporating some of them into my debut book to be published by New Holland. Hopefully it will be available in all good bookshops (and a few terrible ones) from August.
I have bared my birding soul though steered clear of a lot of the sex and violence. All that stuff will be in my next book that I will write under a pseudonym. The Urban Birder – Uncle Birds & Jedi Knights will be an eye opener for some of you.
Keep tuned for more news.

On the last leg

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Waxwing (Will Webb)
I have been quietly writing a book for the past month or so desperately trying to complete it by my new extended deadline. If I can finish it by the weekend then I stand a great chance of it being published for the summer. So the race is on to get it all done so that I don’t miss the publishing slot. The book is basically about how The Urban Birder came to be and I’m pretty sure that there will be stuff I’ve written that you may not have known before.
Anyway, I will leave you with this delightful image of one of the Waxwings that I saw locally the other day. It was sent to me by local birder Will Webb. Meanwhile, I shall continue working on my last leg.

Split camp

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All images copyright of Russell F Spencer
A few more images of the gull that Russell F Spencer saw last weekend in Hull. The camp is split between Herring, Yellow-legged and Great Black-back.
What do you think?

For the gull lovers

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Larid (Russell F Spencer)
Herring or Yellow-legged Gull?
Photo taken in Hull, Yorkshire yesterday.

I’ve broken my 2011 Waxwing virginity!

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Waxwings (Russell F Spencer)
The day finally came. It had to come. Having not seen a Waxwing this current invasion bar a small flock of birds, possibly Waxwings, that flew across the rooftops of Archway, north London back in early January whilst I was motoring, I got tempted by twitching.
Whilst driving through Kensington, I got a call from my mate saying that he was watching a flock of Waxwings in Kilburn, which wasn’t a million miles away from where I was. I’ve had a few calls like that this winter and apart from when a small flock were briefly at The Scrubs in November last year, I resisted all temptation to twitch a flock preferring to try and luck into some myself. Well that plan failed miserably, despite the hours of curb crawling through potential streets in west London. For some reason, the call I received today was the turning point. So I changed direction and headed towards Kilburn.
On the way, my mate called to say that the flock had flown. Was today destined to end in tears? Undeterred and believing that the Force was with me I carried on heading to Kilburn. Seconds later I received a text from my fellow Scrubber Rob. Whilst stationary at a traffic light (in case the Police are reading this) I read his message. ’14 Waxwings visible now on Melrose Avenue NW6′. That address was even closer to me. I changed course and soon I was cruising down Melrose Avenue. Of course, when I saw Rob who was working in someone’s garden on that street (he’s a landscape gardener) he told me the news that I was half expecting. They have flown away, chased off by an angry Mistle Thrush.
Melrose Avenue is one of several streets that feed off a medium sized park called Queens Park, from which the neighbourhood takes it name. I decided to do a street to street search. After around 30 minutes and completely circuiting the park I had drawn a blank. Before giving up, I decided to return to the scene of the crime. I had just driven onto the street when a flock of c14 buzzed over the car heading in the opposite direction. I swung around, parked up and waited. Within 10 minutes I was standing under a tree cooing at the sight of around 14 Waxwings silhouetted against the grey sky.
I was parked on a double yellow line at the end of the road and severe danger of being ticketed. Suddenly, a parking warden (or traffic enforcement officer, as they’re now known) rounded the corner. He started eyeing up my car and I could see him reaching for his ticket machine. I raced over to him and explained that I was watching some wonderful birds all the way from Scandinavia. I had him looking through my bins at them as I explained their status in the UK right now. He was thrilled. Genuinely thrilled. So thrilled that he walked away and with a wave of his hand told me to remain parked on the double yellow line as long as I wanted. Double result!
The Force was with me.