Snow Buntings and Woodcock

 Having checked the stubble field along the cliff tops many times through the last couple of months and seeing nothing but Mipits and Skylarks, I was pleased to be rewarded with a flock of 30+ Snow Buntings yesterday and today. I also flushed a couple of Woodcock - the first of the season for me.

some of the Snow Bunting flock

male, female and juv?

I managed to get a few photo of the birds on the ground, but they are very hard to locate in a big field with their colouring merging so well into the vegetation.

A few Snow Buntings but well hidden

The flock was very mobile this morning and only visited the beach twice while I was there. They circled the field several times before disappearing into the mist.

30 Snow Buntings - almost all the flock

Out of focus, but shows m/f/j plumages

Another view of different plumages

The second Woodcock I flushed - managed to fire off a few frames as it flew towards the trees...

Woodcock, off to find better cover

Hand Made By Roberts

 You know what it's like. There you are walking along the road on a lovely, sunny, freezing cold morning and you see something that reminds you so much of something else that you can't wait to get home and see if your memory is playing tricks.

I saw this near Goxhill:

and it reminded me of Robby The Robot from Forbidden Planet 😂😂

In retrospect it isn't that obvious, but the brain works in mysterious ways sometimes.

On a wildlife front there were good birds around this morning - a Stonechat was my first record down the Trans Pennine Trail.

Yellowhammers

Yellowhammers

Chaffinches

Stonechat

Stonechat

Still a Stonechat

Take It As Red

 Well what a change from yesterday! It was 2 degrees as I walked out yesterday and it was 10 degrees today. I nearly put my shorts back on 😂

Straight down to the Mere then to see what's about. The sky was clearing nicely as I walked through the fields and soon the sun shone brightly as the clouds moved out of the way.

In the hawthorn field the Redwings were present in good numbers again - I counted more than 50 though it's hard to get a decent count as they are so flighty, and fly off as soon as they see any movement. Just 3 Fieldfares today in the tree tops.

Good autumnal colours have been few and far between for some reason this year, with the wind seemingly taking most of the leaves away before they have time to provide a real visual spectacle.

Best I can do for now

The relatively short grass (courtesy of the sheep grazing here often) provides a good habitat for waxcap fungi and I found what I think are Scarlet Waxcap this morning.

Scarlet Waxcap

Scarlet Waxcap closer view

On the way home the drake Long-tailed Duck was out in the middle of the water with a few Goldeneye, but too distant for photos today.

 

A Shelduck flew in with a couple of Mallard and landed on the edge of first field. I walked down to get a better view and a photo or two.

Shelduck off first field

Whooper Swans have been seen regularly over the last couple of months but usually very early in the morning or at dusk, with just a few flying in mid-afternoon. Pity they don't stay longer on the Mere and it would be nice to understand what makes them seek other water bodies to feed on. Depth of water? Specific food? Lack of disturbance? All of the above?

Sunrise Walk Along Hornsea South Cliffs

As the days get shorter it gets easier to be up and out when the sun rises - as I was today.

I've been checking the stubble fields on the cliffs for Shore Larks, Snow Buntings and Lapland Buntings, but I haven't been lucky enough to see any yet. Lapland Buntings were reported last week but on a day when I didn't walk the cliffs.

The day started bright and cold as befits the time of year and we had our first frost of the winter with temperatures down to zero overnight. 

Unfortunately there were no birds of note this morning, but it was a good walk none the less.

Sunrise over Westermost Rough wind farm

The view from higher up on the cliffs showed the north-south tidal drift very clearly.

I couldn't let a breezy day with an incoming tide pass by without getting some spindrift pics now could I 😊

Spindrift off the incoming waves

 

 

Yesterday was a reasonable morning with a bit of sun showing through the clouds which enabled me to get a few birdlife photos. 

 

One of the many Redwing feeding on hawthorn berries

The wintering Barnacle Geese are still here

Close up of a Barnacle Goose's undercarriage

Great Spotted Woodpecker

Lockdown 2 Starts In Style

 The Covid-19 saga rumbles on with no end in sight and as we enter our second lockdown of 2020, one has to wonder how we can defeat this virus or at least start living with it in some meaningful way.

 Meanwhile the world's wildlife is doing what it does best - getting on with life and turning up to enrich our lives.

A possible Ferruginous Duck was spotted on the Mere yesterday morning. I went along to have a look and went out again in the afternoon, but with the light being pretty poor any photos I managed to get were not very clear.

 The primary diagnostic identifier to me was the white undertail coverts and they were obvious through the scope, and show up quite well in the naff photos. Other points such as size, bill length and head shape are not obvious to me.

Ferruginous Duck

From my perspective, it could be

The only time I've seen Ferruginous Duck before was in France in 1999 when a drake in breeding plumage graced my scope and camera lens, in glorious sunshine and from about 50 yards away. This was a totally different matter: a female-type bird in gloomy light from about 300 yards. 

BUT!! The day was fantastic anyway! As others were trying to re-find the FD, I caught up with the adult drake Long-tailed Duck that appeared in the morning. A fabulous bird with, surprise surprise, a long tail. We have had long staying juvs and females before but this is the first adult drake I've seen here. Wonderful bird but too distant for good pics. Now, if KP had been open...

Also, while watching the FD an adult Slavonian Grebe swam by and 2 Whopper Swans that landed earlier were in the foreground.

Whooper Swans in the supporting cast

The light was fading fast so I packed up the scope just as the Starling murmuration started in earnest 😀

I only had my long lens so getting photos or video was difficult but the phone helped a bit. This was without doubt the best murmuration I've seen at the Mere and capped a great afternoon's birding.

How many?  Just part of the whole