Waxwing and York Birding

Had a few short birding trips this weekend in the York area.

Some time was spent in my Patchwork Challenge area - where I added Red Kite to my year list. There was a also a small group (5) Lesser Redpolls showing nicely in front of the hide. There was also a young Peregrine Falcon chasing the ducks around. Otherwise it was the usual suspects - Whooper Swans, Black Swan, Shoveler, Wigeon, Teal, Pintail, Lapwing, Golden Plover, Redshank, Ruff, Dunlin, Curlew (substantial increase in numbers). Also a cool partially ermine Stoat! Several Barn Owl gave good entertainment as usual.

Further afield (from my patch) I had good views of a Waxwing in Acomb (record shot below), York and then in the pouring rain at Rufforth Airfield a first-winter Mediterranean Gull was the pick of the bunch.

Waxwing Andy Walker 2015

Chaffinch Andy Walker 2015

Lesser Redpoll 2015

Jack Sh1t

A long day in the local area today. Should have gone to the coast but the potential for Bonxie, Grey Phalarope and Stormies for my local list was too much to ignore! Needless to say I got none of the above!

The highlight today was a Jack Snipe, my first in the local area this autumn. Other highlights included 2 Mediterranean Gulls (1 adult and 1 1st winter), 1 Greenshank and 2 Green Sandpiper.

Not so many thrushes today, just Redwing (c300) and 1 obvious migrant Blackbird.

Had 1 House Martin heading west, first hirundine I've seen for a week.

See what tomorrow brings...

Office MEGA: Med Gull tick & Shelduck Garden Tick!

Anyone who's been following my blog for a while will know I'm an avid keeper of bird lists for where I spend a lot of time, e.g. garden list, office list, survey list, patch list etc etc... nothing serious, just for a bit of fun...

Last night I added a new bird species to my garden list in the form of a very vocal Shelduck flying over at 2315hrs! This was a strange one as only recently I was thinking I should get one during the day due to the numbers currently present (based on my sightings in the LDV recently and info on the excellent, and highly informative LDV ringing blog). This was very satisfying!

Today I was in the office, thousands of gulls fly over each afternoon from their feeding grounds to the Wheldrake/Humber roosts, many times I've wished I'd got bins with me and today I had a pair which resulted in my 2nd tick in a few hours - this time, amongst a flock of small gulls circling the city at around 4pm was a cracking Mediterranean Gull!! A fantastic office tick! Right over York City Centre!!!


Mediterranean Gull (Richard Hampshire)

UPDATE: Got a message from Christopher, a York birder today (8th March) saying he's just had a Med Gull over the River in York near Lendel Bridge, I wonder if its the same bird as the one I had?