North-East Winds

Despite the promising North-east winds very few migrants were seen in Lowestoft this weekend.

At Corton New sewage works, seeing James B we spotted a Common Sandpiper walking rather incongrously on the left hand side of the entrance road to the plant. On the western edge of the works a Whinchat perched briefly on the wire fence before flying down to feed. Avian highlight of the weekend for me!

A trek around the Gunton Old rail track was enlivened by the company of other friends Chris M & Peter K, just as well as I saw no birds of note. Although the other Peter briefly saw a Pied Fly.

A seawatch in the afternoon a look at the weather conditions promised much but inevitably was a let down with an immature Kittiwake and Common Tern the only birds of note during an hours seawatch, with 2 very tame Turnstones running along the ledge in front of me, vying for my attention.

Greenfinch Health Warning

Sadly, I found another very sick looking Greenfinch in the garden today. This is the second bird I have found ailing in the garden (see my earlier blog Greenfinch R.I.P. posted on 6 Aug 2009).

The bird was an adult male looking very lethargic an allowing me a very close approach, it's plumage was scraggy looking puffed up and it appeared to be constantly gasping for air. Exactly the same symptoms I had witnessed in the earlier bird which also showed matted wet plumage around the face and the beak.

Being concerned I investigated on the internet and found out exactly what the problem is.

Looking on the excellent RSPB site they had a page on the Trichomonad parasite that is killing Greenfinches in gardens, apparently the parasite lives in the upper digestive tract of the bird progressively blocking it's oesophagus eventually killing the bird through starvation as the food it tries to digest cannot be swallowed/ digested. 

Nothing can be done sadly to cure the bird.

Apparently the only thing that could be done (according to the RSPB ) was to clear all the finch feeders, disinfect them, clear bird feeding surfaces and not feed the finches for 2 weeks. This is to discourage birds from feeding collectively and therefore pass on the parasite from the infected bird or it's saliva/ excreta to another host.

Rain stops play!

An after work visit in the early evening to the old Corton sewage works site revealed a young Spotted Flycatcher dashing all over the place in the windy conditions. Always nice to see, the Spotted Flycatcher is a declining summer visitor and now more often seen in the local area on migration. It used the same high hedge area that hosted so many Spotted Flycatchers, Pied Flycatchers & Redstarts during the spectacular fall of migrants in the area last September. 

The visit was abruptly curtailed by the sudden onslaught of a rain shower.

Pictured is one of those Spotted Flycatchers from exactly the same spot seen and photographed in September 2008.

North Denes

A Garden Warbler was seen on a bush along the North Denes slope, whilst on the North Denes itself a Painted Lady flew by. These were the only migrants seen during an early evening walk around the area, yesterday.

B(l)ank Holiday Monday

A walk around the North Denes and the net posts today revealed zero migrant activity (same as the last 2 days for me!) and just the resident birds 5 House Sparrow, Linnet, Magpie and 2 young Pied Wagtails. Not even a Wheatear was seen.

Arnold's Walk was little better save for 3 Song Thrushes in the brambles and up to 4 Migrant Hawker dragonflies. Very disappointing, sadly any migrants seen here are quickly and regularly flushed by the myriad dog walkers which are seen here all the time.

Meanwhile in the garden 2 young Goldfinch and 2 adults are feeding regularly from the Niger seed feeder. The young Goldfinch is pale buff coloured with with black and white feathering looking like overlapping ovals on the undertail coverts.

Very confiding Kestrel

On a walk down to Horsey Beach from the Nelson's Head pub, 2/3 of the way along the track, a juvenile Kestrel posed down incredibly to just 1 foot as it hunted for food in the nearby field.

It would look intently from the fence posts and then fly into the field before flying back to a post. It must have been a recently fledged juvenile from the nest as it didn't seem to catch anything during the period of observation and it didn't hover once either, preferring short flights and then dropping down to the ground. It drew an appreciative crowd, as camera were whipped out and photo's taken of it, in the manner of papparazi photographing celebrities at a film premiere.

Also seen on the walk down was a fine male Emperor Dragonfly. 

On the beach 2 Grey Seals poked the head up out of the water just a few yards from the water's edge.

Daubenton Dip

Last night I attended a very well organised Bat & Moth Night held at the Eels Foot Inn at Ormesby St. Michael and a boat trip out onto the Broad to look for Daubenton's Bats.

The boat trip was preceded by an excellent slide talk about the 16 species of bat seen in the UK delivered by a very knowledgable bat expert.

Unfortunately, the weather wasn't playing ball and what should have been a lovely summer's evening felt more autumnal with a cold wind prevalent. This put paid to seeing very much, the only moths caught included 2 Herbaceous Hebrew Characters but the organisers had caught some moths earlier in true Blue Peter tradition and they showed us ones they'd caught earlier. These included Garden Tiger, Dark Arches and 3 others which I can't recall the names exactly but may have been called something like Dark Longshanks and a yellow moth called something like Yellow Canary Surprise and Brass beauty. Update, 1/9/09 The actual names of these moths were Dark Swordgrass, Canary shouldered Thorn and Burnished Brass, thanks to Peter C for supplying me with the correct names.

These moths have wonderfully evocative names because they were originally given their names by Victorian clergy.

An exciting boat trip armed with ultrasonic bat detectors which clicked when a bat was near revealed about 15 Pipistrelles in flight but I did not see any obvious Daubenton Bats, oh well I'll have to try again next year.