A quiet Sunday morning

I got up quite late, for me, on Sunday morning. After a quick read of the Sunday Times and some breakfast I was working out whether it was going to be too hot to do gardening or whether I should bite the bullet and clear-up around the house! I had a quick check on my phone, more out of curiosity than in the expectation of anything interesting. The only thing on the Casual twitchers WhatsApp was a Cape gull at Grafham water. For a minute I thought this was just one of those "interesting" sub-species of lesser black-backed gull or the like. Then I noticed the three-part binomial - Larus dominicanus vetula. Larus - so its a gull, but "dominicanus", that was one I didn't recognise. L.fuscus is LBBG so it wasn't one of them. The WhatsApp chat was clearly pointing to a real mega and I quickly worked out that this was a sub-species/ race of Kelp gull and if so was a first for the UK!!!!! Others were already in their cars and heading to the reservoir. Fortunately all my gear was in the hall and the car was full enough with petrol. I grabbed a water bottle, explained my sudden change of plan to Judith and was on the road within 15 minutes of the alert coming in. 

Fortunately Grafham water is only an hours drive north of me and the traffic wasn't too bad. Just after 11.30 I pulled into a very busy car-park and found a space. Mostly it was families and holiday makers, who looked a bit surprised at all my photo gear and telescope being yomped across the car park towards the dam. There were I guess 50 or so birders by the dam wall looking out.

I asked the first people I met "is it showing?". Oh yes it was, loafing on the mud no more than 50 metres away!!!

There were very few other gulls around and this was a real brute of a bird!

The bird had been identified as a Cape gull, which is a sub-species of kelp gull.  They normally inhabit the west coast of Africa from southern Sahara down through Mauretania and the Gambia and South Africa. It has been put forward as a species which should eventually get here but so far there had been no records, until today. With it being so obviously chilled out I relaxed a bit, met up with a couple of others birders I knew including Brook Perrins, and started to study this strange beast. 

I suspect like many there I would not be able to identify it if I saw it without prior knowledge. It did stand out as very different though, with its grey-green, long, rangy legs and a really strong bill.

Others more knowledgable than myself put it down as a 3rd or 4th calendar year bird. Interestingly it was in the company of number of yellow-legged gulls. These are common on southern Europe and may very well have acted as a carrier for the Cape gull as they dispersed north after breeding.

You could get a good comparison of the mantle colour when they stood near to each other. It was very noticeable that the Cape gull had legs very widely spaced apart!

Whilst I was there, from 12 to 2, it was very hot and the crowd was building steadily till it was at least 300 strong. 

The gull showed no sign of moving away from its patch on the beach though. The closest it got to movement was occasionally having a stroll into the water for a drink and a quick preen.

When it finally came ashore and sat down I thought it was time to head back home. Would have been nice to see it fly but it was now really hot and my water bottle was empty. My prime space on the wall was quickly snapped up by others arriving with broad smiles on their faces. 

It was estimated that over 1000 people connected on Sunday. The bird is still there today (Monday) and it sounds like there's another large crowd, with some going for seconds already. My 10th lifer for the UK this year and a very welcome one as it was so close to home.

A monday morning double.

 My year list is a bit of a curates egg so far. Before today it was 234, which is pretty good and my third highest July total. There are some big gaps (Scotland specialities, redstart, long-tailed duck....) so I took the chance to have a swing down to the south coast to top it up a bit. There were two main targets, both of which would be "second in the country" ticks. The first was a whiskered tern at Fishlake meadows near Southampton. My only other one was last May at Abbotsbury when I managed to combine a visit to see my mother-in-law with a twitch! I've had a chequered history at Fishlake, dipping a caspian tern , purple heron and osprey there before. It's a funny old site, very large but with quite challenging viewing options. The main sites for the terns, including this one, are two small areas down a slope off the main road. Not so much a viewing area as a gap in the trees, with room for only about 5 birders. I parked up in the housing estate opposite, eschewing the carpark which is 30 minutes walk away. I later discovered a "map" pointing to this on my car left by a disgruntled local who is apparently fed up with birders parking on "his" public road. Anyway, a 3 minute walk and a scramble down the bank got me to the point where I could see the lake.

As you can see, its pretty challenging but the tern had been faithful to this area for a few days so I was hopeful. First up, all I could see was a very large number of egrets and herons, including four or five great white egrets, a strangely common sight nowadays!

By now two other birders had joined me and we scanned the lake for any sign of the tern. After 10 minutes I got onto one flying very distantly at the back of the lake, way too far off to be identifiable though. After another wait it returned and this time decided to come nearer and perch on a dead tree. This enabled us to positively identify it as the whiskered tern.

Whiskered terns are closely related to the marsh-terns (black tern etc) rather than the common or Arctic terns we see most frequently. They are notable for their swallow-like flight picking insects off the surface as well as eating fish and small amphibians. They are normally to be found much further south, in Spain or Italy or across to Asia. They are bulkier than black terns and, as you can see in the photo, have a very strong, dark-red  bill.

The demarkation line of the black cap is very pronounced and its belly even at distance showed as being dusky black. It spent most of its time just sitting on trees, mainly at some distance away, but every 20 minutes would have a fly around for something to eat, never coming more than halfway across the lake towards us.

It was now getting close to 9.30 and with the rush-hour traffic hopefully subsiding I called it a day here and went for my second target, a squacco heron. This was another bird which had been around for quite a few days, this time in a ditch near Shoreham. My only previous UK bird was ages ago, 2011, near Nottingham in a rainstorm! I was hopeful this one would be a bit easier. Following excellent directions from the CT WhatsAppp group I parked up near the farm and had a 10 minute walk across some fields to a river bank where 10 birders were 'scoping a wet area in the field.

Behind us was tidal salt-marsh and the bank marked the dividing line.

What was immediately noticeable was the sheer number of herons and egrets around - both little and cattle egrets as well as grey herons. 

You can see why the squacco would like it here! Anyway, the birders on site said it has been showing only 5 minutes before in a patch of reeds straight out from us. I got my 'scope on the area and waited. After 15 minutes I could see a buffy-coloured shape moving at the back.

Not the best views but enough to make it out as the squacco heron. This is another waif and stray in this country, normally found in southern Europe or there coast of northern Africa, where it is relatively common. It is a small bird, much smaller even than a little egret.

Its buffy colouration and crest together with its broad beak mark it out. I spent over an hour watching it, during which time it followed a clear pattern. Stand in one place for ages not moving whilst waiting for something to come nearby that it could eat.

If that didn't work, fly a short distance to another place and try again.

and then repeat this again!!! Despite there being lots of egrets around it seemed to not like them and chased them off if they came close. It only tolerated a couple of godwits and a gull to be near it.

Finally it flew, not far but round the corner in the ditch and out of sight. I took that as a sign to leave and headed back to the car. 

A good two-tick day with a couple of very good birds. Some nice craic with the other birders and I managed to get home before it got too hot!