Catch up...

 A quick catch up of April so far .

Since the last general post a few more migrants have appeared locally. On 6th a very early Willow Warbler sang in our garden at first light but was gone by 7am. There arent many here yet but we did have 5 singing at Brizlee at the weekend.

A pair of Greenfinches at our feeders were the first to do this, this year and Hairy footed Flower Bees were out in good numbers when the sun was shining.

One good (?) bird was seen briefly on the coast path on the 8th. An Egyptian Goose flew north past the Bathing House followed by 11 Whooper Swans. The Goose is only the second record here after one last year. They'll be breeding on the pond soon no doubt. Our first Swallow was over our house on the 8th but they are still not here in any numbers.

On 9th, John and me walked up the Hulne Parks south wall to Brizlee. It was cool and damp with little to show other than 2 Red Grouse, a few Curlew, a singing Willow Tit and best of all a close, but unseen, Green Woodpecker yaffling loudly. 

Willow Tit singing at me.

  Near by 2 Adders were our first of the season.

Adder

Over Easter weekend an in house spider hunt revealed not only the Uloborus plumipes already posted, but Pisaura miribalis, Pardosa sp, Woodlouse Spider, Zygiella x-notata and an Oonops in the bathroom.

The local Blackcaps were late to the party on the 14th with 3 singing in our village wood.

When driving back from Alnwick on 15th we were over flown by a Red Kite at Denwick heading south. One day I'll get one on the patch but this was about 4 miles too far west.

Edit - Not sure how I missd this out? But anyway, Sunday 16th saw me and John up at Brizlee again. It was bright and sunny but cold. 5 male Wheatears in 2 places showed well, even in a rain shower, several displaying Redpolls chased and buzzed around the car and a Bilberry Bumblebee was on a sallow beside the road.

Displaying Curlew

Wheatear in the rain.

 

On the 18th another poor patch year tick materialised on the coast path when we flushed a pair of Red legged Partridges. I didnt see one here last year so they were sort of welcome.

Holly Blue has shown well in the garden this week with 1 on the 15th and 3 on the 20th. Seems like a good start to the year for them...

One worn and one fresh Holly Blue in the garden...

As usual the wind is swinging North for the weekend so it will be baltic while the rest of the country is basking in 18 degrees. 

Dark edged Bee Fly.

It feels like spring.

 

Alnmouth with Coquet Island in the distance.

Sunday was a calm and pleasant day, getting brighter as it wore on and for once spring was in the air. What breeze there was, came from an ENE direction building hopes that we might come across something out of the ordinary. Unfortunately we didnt turn up anything rare but we still had a good morning seeing a few migrants.  

I met John at Alnmouth Cricket Club at 7am. A stroll down to the water works and flood meadows was filled with bird sounds. Lapwings and Redshanks displaying, Geese clattering around, a Water Rail squealed from a dense patch of phragmites and the sound of Chiffchaffs rang from every tree tall enough. 

A field near the track held some Mad March Hares, in April, with 8 or more chasing and boxing around.

Brown Hares mating.

 While watching these, a pair of Shoveler flushed from the small pond to settle again on a flash near the river.

Next we took the car down to the estuary. From here we covered the rest of the patch including the shore, bracken hill, and the estuary itself.

At this time there is an odd mix of birds of both summer and winter. There was a lone Barnacle Goose swimming up river beside a drake Red breasted Merganser, 25+ Wigeon, 20 Teal, 153 Curlew, a Goosander and 80+ Pinkfeet North while newly arrived birds included a female Wheatear, 4 Sand Martins, many Chiffchaffs, a Little Egret and 15+ Shelduck . There was no sign of the Avocet John had here mid week.

Little Egret

Incoming Sand Martin.

Stonechat on shed in the dunes.

Teal looking very smart in the sunshine.

Wheatear flew from beach and relocated in paddock on top of bracken hill.

 Later in the morning the warm sun brought out a few insects - 2 Small Tortoiseshells and a scatter of Hairy footed Flower Bees.

A small solitary bee, I'll need advice from specialists for this one...Andrena scotica. 

A male Hairy footed Flower Bee showing is feathered legs and the white blaze...

Small Tortoiseshell, the first butterfly of the year for me.

Back home at lunchtime, I was pleased to give the lawn its first cut after a wet March. Now I can let the meadow kick in. In the garden were more Hairy feet and 2 Peacock butterflies...

Peacock in the garden.

  

Its an ill wind...

 Still the North wind doth blow. Our most regular April feature.

Although migrants continue to trickle in, there are no big numbers. It just feels like its all to happen.

Since last week, on the patch, breeding has been confirmed in a few more common species with fledged Song Thrush, Blackbird and Mallard, while Long tailed Tit, Chaffinch, Linnet, Coot and Mute Swan are all still with nests. I'm not seeing much nestbox activity from the Tree Sparrows yet though, none in fact despite several males doing their banana posture display around the garden.

Over the weekend, around the village the first male Orange Tip put in an appearance, showing that once out of the cold wind, the sunny areas are warm enough for insect activity.

A couple of walks out with Peggy yesterday were very pleasant.  At last a few more Wheatears had arrived and even better, were viewable from our house when 3 males and 2 females adorned the back field. One looked bigger and brighter, despite the distance, looking good for a Greenland.

Overhead at the pond field, a kettle of 5 Buzzards squabbled and drifted high south while back at home another 3 were around the Heugh area.

All Buzzards.

    

One looks bigger and brighter than the other? Wheatears.

On Sunday morning it was back inland where places are much less busy.

Redstarts were back in, with one singing nicely at eye level from a tree top down a bank from the road. Unfortunately by the time the camera was sought, it had gone. Others were heard singing in various spots around the place.

The moors are a riot of bird song now with Willow Warblers, Redpolls, Linnets, Curlews and Lapwings all displaying while Snipe 'tick-tocked' away in the background.

Lesser Redpoll on territory.

In the bottom of a, south facing, sheltered slope insects were active. Bumblebees were very evident on bilberry flowers , with White tailed, Buff tailed, Common Carder as you would expect but also Mountain Bumbler Bombus monticola and Red tailed Cuckoo Bee Bombus rupestris. Pity they are nigh impossible to photograph! The 3 monticola all made a buzz for it as soon as I raised a lens. I'll try again when the weather is more pleasant.

White tailed Bumblebee. 

There were several Green Tiger Beetles on the tracks and burnt heather areas. Speaking of which, we were looking for Green Hairstreaks in this area. Some previously good spots are now lifeless and  charcoal blackened. In the image above you can see an area just left of the copse where the self set Birches are. Luckily some habitat remains and we found 4 of the little green jewels. a little way further down. A short spell luring Emperor Moths attracted 3 males. 

The bilberry around the tumbled down wall was buzzing with bumblebees. 

Formerly the home of Green Hairstreak and Emperor Moth... 

Green Hairstreak butterflies . 4 seen. 

A fast moving Emperor Moth.

Back home in the afternoon, reports of loads (!) of white winged gulls at or passing Boulmer where up to 5 Glaucs and 2 Iceland had passed, enticed me out to Cullernose. I can see Boulmer from here, but could I see any arctic gulls? Not a sniff. Not many gulls at all, certainly no passage. Maybe the Boulmer birds were following feeding frenzies rather than moving north? My highlight from 6pm - 7pm was 1 Bonxie and 1 Red throated Diver both N. 

Vaccine blues...

 Yesterday Jane and myself headed up to Berwick for our first COVID jab. It all went like clockwork and we were back home before lunchtime. I had read about the aftermath of the injection and all the people I had spoken to had suffered some side effects to a greater or lesser extent, but its all worth it in these times of pandemic.

I felt fine until after about 9pm last night when the shivering started. My fingers went white and I couldn't keep my legs still for nagging aches. Despite taking paracetamol this continued all night and this morning I felt like I had a big hangover. Still, I thought I better try and shrug it off and get out for a walk to Boulmer.

The morning was beautifully clear and sunny if a little cool. Yesterday, both John and myself had opted not to twitch the 20 miles south for the pristine Citrine Wagtail at Lynemouth. Even though it was a stunner, I've had a few in the county, so would have preferred to see something more local.

As it turned out, it was a very quiet morning bird wise. Nothing was moving at sea and land migrants were equally sparse. Still, the first Wheatear of the year was flitting around Longhoughton Steel and a few Sand Martins trilled overhead. Otherwise, 13 Purple Sandpipers, 5 Grey Plover, 250+ Pinkfeet N and a singing male Greenfinch were all the headland had to offer.

I turned over a few stones on the dune edge and found a Hairy Rove Beetle Creophilus maxillus, but didn't have any pots or lens to get a shot.

Young Grey Seal

Male Wheatear.

Around the garden yesterday and today, Hairy-footed Flower Bees were active, still all males, alongside, Garden, Tree, Red tailed and Buff tailed Bumblebees. An early Orange Tip was in the village wood.

The reason why they are called Hairy footed Flower Bees.

 

Boulmer

It was a very big tide at Boulmer this morning. 5.4mtrs brought it within 2 mtrs of the grass at full tide around 6.30am. Its not often you cant walk in front of the village. At low tide it will have been a kilometre out beyond the rocky skeers. The morning began very pleasantly with  clear skies and a light, cool westerly breeze.

Before we made our move a scan of the remaining beach had 5 Goosanders and 20 Pied Wagtails over flown by a female Sparrowhawk. There was a steady passage of hirundines with 120 south in the first half an hour. While looking along south to Seaton Point ( top image) an angler wearing chest waders was fishing a lure in quite shallow water where he caught a nice, silver, Bass that appeared to be around the 3lbs mark. Note, I don't call them 'Sea Bass'? I leave that to the chefs because we only have one Bass in the UK and they were never 'sea bass'. Just Bass.

We walked north beyond the village to see if there were any migrants around. It was always going to be unlikely with this weather. We did have 4 Wheatears and 2 Sedge Warblers in the mugwort though, plus a lone Willow Warbler that came out of some long grass on the edge of the beach and flew West. A covey of 8 Grey Partridges looked a bit moulty in the field west of the coast path.

Waders were in reasonable numbers with - 

2 juvenile Curlew Sandpipers, 36 Dunlin, 6 Sanderling, 7 Knot, 17 Ringed Plover, 47 Golden Plover, 6 Bar tailed Godwit, 1 Whimbrel, 30+ Curlew, 30+ Turnstones and a call only Greenshank.

10+ Swifts were over Longhoughton Steel.

A small gull roost in the field consisted of 40+ Great black backed, 1 Lesser black backed that looked very dark , possibly 'intermedius'  and 6+ Herring Gulls. Most of the terns seem to have gone with only 6+ Sandwich Terns being seen.

By now the summer crowds were arriving so it was time to move off.

     We moved only a mile or so away to Foxton Bends, a meander in the River Aln that sometimes holds waders. Today we had 6 Little Egrets, 2 Greenshank, 2 Common Sandpiper, 2 Dunlin, 20+ Curlew, 9 Teal, a Yellow Wagtail and a Kingfisher. A female Redstart flew across the road but we couldn't relocate it. Not a bad little stop. 

Then it was back home where the moth trap was waiting. The catch was uninspiring but the bycatch was quite nice, a Twin-spot Centurion Sargus bipunctatus, a lovely soldierfly...

Twin spot Centurion Sargus bipunctatus 

One for Mr Gale...

My first Patch Wheatears of the year were down the teepee track this evening. A male with two hens looked bound for Greenland to me, being a bold brassy well marked individual. Still no hirundines though, maybe this weekend will turn up some more summer visitors, but I feel that another week will be needed to gee things up a bit here...

My Surrey colleague, Steve, is doing better than me on the percentages scale. This one puts me on exactly 75%. Maybe a bit more for the PWC list as I had a slow year in 2014...I am thinking things might slow up on his inland patch while things hot up here in the autumn...

105. Wheatear 

Roaming in the gloaming...

What a change since last weekend. Gone are the clear blue skies and sunny days. Instead of basking in summer temps with sun like more southern counties, Northumberland and east Scotland are about the only areas of the UK to have proper March weather.  At the minute, day time temps are not exceeding 8 degrees, and down to 5 at night. It could be July before we see a 20.

As we have an easterly breeze causing the fog and cool temps, I thought there might be the chance of a migrant or two, but the coast is very quiet.

Over the last couple of days I have walked the Howick to Craster stretch, Low Newton and Newton Point, the Long Nanny and Boulmer with little to show really.

While listening to the congregation singing in the Tin Church at Low Newton (above) 2 Willow Tits called nearby.

Migrants came in the form of several Chiffchaffs on the coast, a lone Wheatear at Newton Point, a Black Redstart at Boulmer ( courtesy of Dave Dack), 2 Redwings sub singing at Low Newton Pools and some littoralis Rock Pipits at all sites.  A Fieldfare dropped into the copse beside our garden this morning.

This Powdered Quaker was a new addition to the garden moth year list on Friday night.