A little late to the party

After several days of northerlies, migration exploded back in to life on Sunday in quite impressive fashion. I moved house over the weekend and had no time to get out birding, this made all the more galling by the appearance of a Red-winged Blackbird on North Ronaldsay - which I knew I had absolutely no chance of doing anything about, even if I am a bit of a failed twitcher these days.

I was heading back to Lincolnshire on Monday to see family, so was quite excited to hit my old patch, Baston & Langtoft Pits - particularly as a moderate south-easterly was blowing when I woke up and, as I drove north, occasional showers were passing through. Actually, it turned out to be a bit of a disappointment with the best birds of the morning being two adult Whooper Swans flying north and a Bar-tailed Godwit flying through in the evening - not a patch on the previous day's dynamism, and I couldn't help but feel that I was a little late to the party. That said, 13 Dunlin was a figure virtually unimaginable here in the days I used to watch BLGP (wader habitat was always in limited supply compared to nowadays) and there were good numbers of breeding waders plus the usual singing warblers and a Cuckoo - no Turtle Doves though.

I visited Barnack's delightful Hills and Holes reserve with my mother late morning. I remember going here as a small kid and being thrilled by Marbled Whites, Six-spot Burnets and so on, and it's been a place I've treasured ever since. Clearly a bit early for the above insects (and rather cold too!), but a good carpet of Pasqueflowers, Cowslips and Early Purple Orchids.

Early Purple Orchid, Barnack, 1 May 2017

Someone had found a Black Redstart at Deeping Lakes earlier in the day so, after a family meal, I twitched it. An area tick for me, this was a fairly confiding (and very vocal) bird. Pintail was a good May record there and another Cuckoo was singing plus plenty of Common Terns over the main lake.

Black Redstart, Deeping Lakes, 1 May 2017

Back at BLGP early on Tuesday morning, misty conditions had grounded singles of Greenshank and Eurasian Curlew but, most satisfyingly, a female Long-tailed Duck was present on the Corner Pit on the north side of the complex. This is the second I've seen here (following one in December 2006) and appears to be the bird last seen at nearby Deeping Lakes on 23 April.

Female Long-tailed Duck, Baston & Langtoft Pits, 2 May 2017

Black Swan - present intermittently on the same island on 1 and 2 May. No idea where it went when it wasn't there.

Taiwan stuff to come soon, hopefully.

Quick trip to North Yorks

Imagine opening your curtains one morning and seeing this hopping about in the road!

Popped up to North Yorkshire in the ever-delightful company of Dan Pointon to have a look at this gorgeous Eastern Black Redstart (P. o. phoencuroides), which had been busying itself about a housing estate on the north side of Scalby for a few days. I can't entirely remember why I didn't see either of the 2011 birds, though I suspect the reason was something list-orientated - not bothering to travel for a subspecies (or similar).

Male Black Redstarts are seriously brilliant birds and this one, with its brick-red breast and belly sharply demarcated from the black face and throat, grey forehead and brownish upperparts was one handsome beast. At times it looked remarkably Common Redstart-like but both behaviour and structure were much more reminiscent of Black Redstart. I'd actually go as far as saying this is one of the best-looking birds I've seen in Britain and the fact that it's not a species in its own right shouldn't detract from that.

Unfortunately behaviour didn't match appearance and while it did show incredibly well on a few fairly brief occasions, it was utterly restless and kept zipping off in to gardens. It appeared to be conducting a fairly loose circuit, ranging over a good few hundred metres (at one point it stormed off down the hedgerow of an adjacent field and didn't come back for a couple of hours). As such it proved a frustrating subject for the lens but there are some decent pics floating about the internet now. Here are a couple of my best, more on Flickr as always:

We also popped up to nearby Cloughton Wyke where we found the Richard's Pipit in its favoured field south of the Hayburn Wyke Inn. A really big and obvious bird that called frequently, it was also typically mobile and wary.

I suspect that will be it for the good birds now this year, unless someone turfs out a surprise passerine. Come to think of it, has there ever been a better year for a late, late autumn hyper-rarity? The mild weather seems to be encouraging a number of common migrants to attempt to winter here - think Swallows, Whinchats and two species of warbler on a Leyton traffic island, for example. A Siberian Accentor would be ideal, as would a Black-faced Bunting - though I'd settle for a Pine!

If you go down in the woods today...

... Ribeira da Ponte, specifically, you'd have seen a fine first-winter male American Redstart. Found mid-afternoon by Gordon Beck very close to where he found last year's Magnolia Warbler, the bird showed very well through to early evening when we left. Though it would go missing for short periods and was quite mobile, it regularly re-announced its presence with a typical wood-warbler 'tsiip' and responded very well to tape. However, in the dark ribeiras, good photos are obtained only by the professionals - a bird constantly on the move up high in the canopy makes for a difficult subject for mere mortals such as I. Views through the bins were absolutely mind-blowing though. A great start to the trip - with good (not great, but decent enough) winds forecast, hopefully a few more birds yet.