This post is guaranteed to contain no Short-eared Owl photos. Honestly, how many Short-eared Owl photos does the world need? Due to the presence of our wonderful avian celebrity visitors, the dunes in January have been absolutely swamped with photographers throughout the month. Many were also birders, therefore aware of issues of disturbance and field craft, who kept to the footpaths and were careful not to flush the owls, but many more were members of the non-birding long-lens-no-bins brigade, and sadly a not insignificant proportion of these, who seemed to want to get their shot at any cost, consistently hounded the birds, chasing after them when they saw them land, trampling through the heather and marram and putting them up again for yet another action shot. Our birds here have enough problems with off-lead and often out of control dogs racing across every inch of what is supposed to be a National Nature Reserve and Site of Special Scientific Interest, without humans who supposedly profess an interest in the natural world adding to their woes. Rant over; I will now get on with what else we saw in January!
The month began with Pat out first and finding the ringtail Hen Harrier hunting for over an hour in the fields around the concrete track, and Mick confirming that the Tree Sparrow was still around - a crucial year tick for us all on day one!
The concrete track area also held 3 Cranes (two adults and a young bird who were to remain in the same general area for most of the rest of the month), a showy Great White Egret and seven Whooper Swans flying south east mid-afternoon. A few Fieldfares were also around and two Mistle Thrushes in the field at the end of Low Road were a relief for Sean, who one year recently had to wait until December to get them on his patch year list!
On the morning of the 2nd Barry found a Shag on one of the groynes. Several of us went up for it a bit later and relocated it a few groynes down, looking distinctly unwell. It perked up a bit in the sun but later tucked itself further in to the crevices between the rocks, where it swayed unsteadily. By the afternoon it could not be found.
On the 3rd Sean found a pair of Bullfinches in a hedge along Low Road, always a tricky bird for the yearlist, and Maynard a Siskin in the valley.
On the 4th Mick had two Purple Sandpipers on one of the north beach groynes, and on the 5th he had 5 Fieldfares in off and 2 Ringed Plovers on the beach. They tend to disappear from the beach over the winter so it is always a pleasure to see them in January.
On the 6th Pat relocated one of Sean's Bullfinches in the same place, and snapped a record shot.
A fishing Little Egret had replaced the Great White in Commissioner's Dyke, and the ringtail Hen Harrier, a Kingfisher and several Song Thrushes were about on the inland part of the patch. Colin had a Gadwall in the dyke, the only one of the month.
On the 7th Colin noticed that both species of Egret had come to a truce and decided to share the Dyke, Tim had a male Merlin in the paddocks and Barry found two male Bullfinches in a different location along the concrete track. A bit later Barry also found this splendid Black Redstart which had taken up residence amongst the debris below the cliff at the bottom of Beach Road which had tumbled over during the recent high tides. We often seem to get a Black Redstart on or near the beach in early January! There was also a female Eider off the south beach.
Also on the 7th a visiting birder, Tim S, had a 20 second encounter with a Waxwing in the North Dunes, which flew west over him (presumably having just arrived off the sea), hovered once over the heather, and then shot off towards the woods. Despite how brief the encounter was, Tim managed to capture this record shot.
Another of our regular visitor Chris came up from Bedfordshire on the 8th and as well as the Black Redstart which had remained overnight he saw a Purple Sandpiper on the tank traps below the car park. Clearly the Sandpiper found a good source of food here as it could be seen there daily at the right tide time for the rest of the month.
As the seals moved off the beach after their breeding season it became possible to walk north again, and the level of pup mortality seemed extremely high this year. Between the car park and Bullet Hill there must have been almost a hundred little white corpses. The awful storms had surely done considerable damage to the colony this year. Looking on the bright side though, we had high hopes of attracting some nice white wingers to this veritable gull cafe.
We also had high hopes of another white winger. In nearby Martham around this time several Cattle Egrets had turned up. This is a species we have never seen in Winterton but the pundits amongst us have widely predicted to be the next addition to our list. However we've recently lost our only cattle herd, and it wasn't to be, despite them hanging around just a couple of miles away for ages!
On the 12th Sean and Colin saw a Green Sandpiper flying around, presumably disturbed by the shoot. We have heard that this is the last year of shooting on the Burnley Hall estate, and boy are they making the most of it! On almost every day in January hoorays have been blasting birds from the sky. It's certainly made seeing Woodcocks a doddle this month! After one particular volley of gunshots a Buzzard stumbled through the sky, emerging from of the woods with most of its primaries missing from one wing. I'm not absolutely certain that it was toff damage but circumstantial evidence is strong...
On the 13th Sean and Tim saw the first Little Grebe on the patch for two years! Pat saw the first Treecreeper of the year along the concrete track, as well as the Bullfinches that Barry had found a week earlier. He also heard a Water Rail along the Holmes Road - a very tricky year tick since we don't allow nocmig recordings (a rule that really ought to be reviewed I feel 😂).
Several Barn Owls were being seen on the patch around this time too, often hunting in daylight and providing alternative owl photography options for some...
On the 16th Pat had a very large Peregrine from the concrete track, the only one of the month. Snipe and Green Woodpecker were also added by others to the collective yearlist.
On the 17th Sean found 5 Russian White-fronted Geese in with the Pink-footed Geese at Bramble Gap, which were seen again over the next few days.
On the 19th Barry saw 15 Snow Buntings on north beach. They had disappeared for a few weeks so it was good to see them back, including a few nice males. Ted took this nice photo of one later in the month.
Later that day Sean saw a single female Common Scoter off the south beach, and was lucky enough to see this Iceland Gull as it cruised south, ignoring all the nice seal meat below it. Kittiwakes were also passing in small numbers.
On the morning of the 21st there was a Treecreeper again near the old Poplar wood, an adult Lesser Black-backed Gull at the Commissioner's pool, and another Treecreeper along Holmes Road, accompanying the tit flock along with this Chiffchaff.
Much more surprisingly, Sean found an entirely out of season Lesser Whitethroat along the Holmes Road.
On the 23rd Pat found two Dunlin on the Commisioner's pool, and a nice Green Sandpiper which unusually hung around out in the open for the rest of the month, rather than hide itself in a ditch.
On the 24th Tim found at least 15 Redwings in one of the paddocks, the largest group of the month, and Sean had the month's second Black Redstart on the northern edge of the village.
On the afternoon of the 25th Mick saw a Merlin hunting along the edge of the East Somerton fields.
The next morning on the 26th Sean was lucky enough to complete the white-winger double with views of a Glaucous Gull flying north through the dunes. One had been reported the previous day at Waxham so it might possibly have been the same bird. Once more it seemed uninterested in the buffet on the beach.
Happy #localbigyear patch birding everyone.
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