A very short roundup this time folks. The month started with a bit of a cold snap. A short seawatch on the 1st produced a Velvet Scoter sitting on the sea, a couple of Eiders past and a Woodcock in off. The rough weather and high tides eroded quite a lot of the dune ridge along the car park and off the sheds - it's getting more and more difficult to settle for a decent seawatch as our favoured places are disappearing...
On the 2nd Colin had a Short-eared Owl in the North Dunes and 3 Cranes from the Concrete Track, whilst a short afternoon seawatch for Sean produced 1 male Goldeneye north, 2 Bonxies south, a male Goosander in off heading presumably towards the Broads, 1 Brent Goose north, a Velvet Scoter, plus a few Eider and Common Scoter.
On the 3rd Colin saw another, or the same Short-eared Owl in North Dunes, and on the 5th he had the three Cranes again in the same place, and a Woodcock heading fast inland through the North Dunes, presumably freshly arrived.
On the 6th Sean saw a ringtail Hen Harrier hunting for quite a while near the inland end of Low Road, and on the 8th he had two juv Little Gulls close in along the surf off the north beach. Colin continued his Short-eared Owl observations again on the the 9th.
Probably the most exciting avian event of the month happened on the 15th when Barry found a Tree Sparrow in the valley, associating with the resident House Sparrow flock. A full-on twitch ensued for those able to get there (ie the retired contingent since it was a weekday), including a dash back from Buckenham for Sean where he had been on a rare trip away from the patch looking for the Taiga Beans - fate was clearly telling him to avoid this sort of irresponsible frippery in the future!
Luckily for those of us who are less of a burden to society and still paying National Insurance contributions, the dinky spadger hung around until the end of the month, allowing most of us to catch up with it in the end. However it proved a tricky blighter to get a decent photo of; Pat probably managed the best ones a couple of weeks later:
Not much more birding got done over the festive period until the month's end. On the 21st Tim had a two Mistle Thrushes from Low Road, and on the 27th Pat had 3 Cranes, 25 Dunlin and several Snipe in the flooded field near Commissioner's Dyke, plus a very distant wader which he initially thought was a Redshank but could have been a Ruff. Graham paid a visit and saw 4 Short-eared Owls in the North Dunes. There seemed to be some movement on the sea too, and in the morning Pat had a fair few ducks moving: Pintails, Wigeon and Teal, plus some waders too: 4 Grey Plover, 4 Redshank, a Purple Sandpiper and a Dunlin. The top waders of the day were in the afternoon though, when Sean had the amazing sight through his scope of 5 Avocets flying south just offshore (plus a Woodcock in off).
Short-eared Owls and the occasional Woodcock continued to be seen occasionally as the year drew to a close, and on the last day Sean confirmed the continuing presence of the Tree Sparrow in the valley, in readiness for the new year lists the next day...
So that was 2021. Mick saw the most species - 181 - which in the end was one more than Sean who decided to remove his heard-only Bearded Tit record since he didn't want to have it on his patch life-list without seeing it as well.
In total we collectively saw 204 species in 2021. That's a good number, and we saw some great birds. We thought about doing a summary of all the best ones here, but you can read about them in the other posts, and it is a sad but true fact that for many of us 2021 will be, and probably should be, remembered more for the incredible lack of supposedly 'common' autumn migrants like Goldcrests and the hastening disappearance of previously regular birds like Marsh Tit (which only a lucky couple of us managed to connect with).
Yes we had some wonderful scarce and rare birds over the year, as ever. But patch birding here, day in day out, is about much more than the rare species; it is about noticing the seasonal comings and goings and ups and downs and successes and failures of all the birds - and all the other species of life - that we are lucky enough to have around us. And it wasn't all doom and gloom - the Little Terns did well for example, and Linnets seem to have had another good year, and Pete refound a rare liverwort... We fervently hope that this time next year we can be writing some more good news: come on you Goldcrests!
Happy New Year to all and happy patch birding in 2022 #LocalBigYear.
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