Northumberland Birding - December 2019

I've just returned from a few days in Northumberland where I managed to get out and about seeing a few nice birds to end the year.

Whilst there, we visited Embelton Bay, Seahouses, Alnmouth, Stag Rock at Bamburgh, St Mary's Island and the Fish Quay at North Shields. Birds seen included; Purple Sandpiper (20+) at Stag Rocks, Turnstones (everywhere), Eider Ducks, Stonechat, Red-throated Diver and Sanderling (Alnmouth beach).

As always, I kept my eyes peeled for Black-headed Gulls, and managed to see a Polish ringed bird at Stag Rocks and a Lithuanian-ringed bird at North Shields Fish Quay.

Polish bird T86W

Lithuanian gull HA02829

I'll update the blog when I get the ringing details back.

Whilst at St Mary's Island, we saw some Grey Seals (adults and juveniles), which the first time for us at this site.

UPDATE: The Lithuanian gull was ringed 1423km away, as a pullus, on 23/06/06, making it over 13 years old.

The Polish gull as ringed, as an adult (2+ years old), 1320km away on 20/05/17, and has been recorded at Stag Rocks every winter since.

Gull Ringing - 21st December 2019

After a few false starts, I managed to get out with Dean and Eleanor from Sorby Breck Ringing Group (and others from Birklands Ringing Group and Mike from Center Parcs) to ring my first Black-headed Gull.

We spent the day at Sherwood Center Parcs, and ringed 3 birds, all 1st winter birds. The bird I ringed, number 246A, was the second bird of the day. I'll look forward to, hopefully, seeing this bird again this winter, or, even better, hearing where it spends the summer.

246A

Linacre WeBS - 15th December 2019

Linacre's December WeBS walk was quite a quiet affair with the following birds seen: Mallard (80), Tufted Duck (just 4!), Mandarin Duck (21), Moorhen (16), Coot (2), Little Grebe (2), Great-crested Grebe (1), Grey Wagtail (1) and Black-headed Gull (58).

Gulls at Rufford - 24th November 2019

After the ringing session on Sunday I had  an hour at Rufford Abbey CP with the gulls. In total I saw 5 colour/darvic ringed birds.

Three of the darvic rings were from the Sorby Breck/Birklands Ringing Group partnership, and involved a familiar bird, 217A, that was ringed at Center Parcs in January 2019, and one I first saw here in February 2019, and then again on 9th November 2019.

217A

The next 2 gulls were numbers 235A and 237A, both ringed at Center Parcs on 13th and 20th November 2019 respectively. These sightings were my first.

235A

237A

The other 2 darviced birds were also well known birds, EUM3 (Dutch ringed) and P519 (Lithuanian ringed), both of which have been seen here on several occasions last winter and this autumn.

Linacre Ringing - 24th November 2019

Yesterday I was down at Linacre for a 4 hour ringing session with 3 other members of Sorby Breck Ringing Group. We had a steady morning, with 41 birds of 11 species.

Numbers were as follows (new/retrap): Blue Tit 6/7, Great Tit 7/5, Long-tailed Tit 1/2, Coal Tit 3/1, Redwing 1/0, Blackbird 1/0, Wren 1/1, Bullfinch 2/0, Chaffinch 1/0 and Jay 1/0.

Linacre WeBS - 23rd November 2019

For the first time this month here's a blog that actually involves Linacre Reservoirs, and not too many Black-headed Gulls!!

I spent an hour and a half down at Linacre this morning (in the rain), carrying out this month's WeBS walk. It was very quiet with the following birds recorded: Mallard (65), Mandarin Duck (5), Tufted Duck ( just 4!), Coot (2), Moorhen (10), Great-crested Grebe (1), Cormorant (2) and Black-headed Gull (40).

The woods were pretty quiet too, with a few Blue, Great, Coal and Long-tailed Tits about. The highlight, however, was a single "wheeting" Chiffchaff seen in the willows by the middle reservoir.

Pomarine Skua!!

We had a trip over to the Grey Seal colony at Donna Nook in Lincolnshire today. We had super views of the seals, including males, females and pups.

Whilst looking at the seals, however, we were amazed to see an adult Pomarine Skua flying over our heads! It landed amongst the seals, about 20m away, and began to eat the afterbirths from the 800+ pups.

Pomarine Skua

Year List update:
194 - Pomarine Skua