Thayer's Gull

Some pics of the West Yorkshire Thayer's Gull, initially in Mirfield around the Biffa waste disposal centre. Then in the roost at Pugneys CP. Tricky lighting conditions with viewing into the sun in Mirfield, washed the bird at so was hard to judge shades, good to see it later at Pugneys.

Brief flyby from a paler cousin

What a load of Bull

Back in Birmingham again for the winter, so decided to head out early this morning after a bit of talk online about the weather looking good for Wood Pigeon movement.

Went to to the Lickey Hills, Worcestershire and stood on Beacon Hill, facing north west. It was pretty foggy on arrival but it started to clear almost straight away. A few thrushes started to move west and then at 07:50 the Wood Pigeons started, I wasn't expecting the crazy numbers that they get at the well known sites and to be honest was really pleased when the first flocks started going over! Got really excited when a flock of 50 were going over at the same time as a 280 in the first couple minutes of them starting to move! It evened out from here on in but was still cool to see flocks of Wood Pigeon streaming over! Had 2 Feral Pigeon in with the Wood Pigeons, is this normal? Presume they just get caught up with them, never heard anyone mention them before (maybe because its Feral Pigeons....)

By 09:30 it had all but finished, final totals being

Wood Pigeon 2,223 (S)
Stock Dove 3 (S) doubtless overlooked
Fieldfare 68 (S/W)
Redwing 77 (S/W) 50 dropped in
Mistle Thrush 2 (S)
Starling 61 (W)
alba wagtail 3 (S)
Chaffinch 17 (S/W)
Great BB Gull 1 1w (W)

Also had several parties of Bullfinch, that seemed to be moving through going south, being pretty high and flying in non direct southerly direction, whether or not they actually moved south, they definitely seemed to be wanting to go somewhere!

I didn't get a sound recording of the first 2, but did of the next 4 and then 7. I'd looked at trying to tell europoea from pileata last winter at Upton Warren here so thought it would be interesting to have a look at the sound recordings from today as the birds seemed to be on the move, maybe they would be europoea?

I stuck them into Audacity and with a bit of playing around came up with these Sonograms

The party of 2 are the top recordings and the 7 are the bottom recordings. Hopefully they come out big enough for the difference to be obvious. The top calls are smooth and slowly downsloping and the bottom calls and more varied. 

From a quick bit of research it would seem to suggest that the top calls from the 2 are pileata and the bottom calls from the flock of 7 are europoea!


This blogpost also shows the calls of europoea recorded in Norfolk
https://sites.google.com/site/tg23birdininabox/daily-dairy/bullfinches

Any feedback would be appreciated from anyone who knows about these calls etc. 

Have europoea ever been recorded in Worcestershire before? I'd guess not but seen as you have to make recordings and sonograms to even come close to proving them, will anyone have bothered?!

Protecting the Spurn area from Caravans!

Please help us oppose the planning application to expand Sandy Beaches Caravan site here at Spurn by liking the Facebook pagehttps://www.facebook.com/saynotomorecaravans and signing the e-petition here http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/opposition-to-the-planned-expansion-of-sandy
 this will only take a short moment of your time and we'd be very grateful if you could, please pass this on to your friends, many thanks

Nikon V1 for sale

If anybodys interested I am now selling my Nikon V1 due to being a poor volunteer!

Nikon V1 with 10-30mm lens kit, brilliant for digiscoping
£250
As new only owned it for less than a year and have hardly used it!
Get in touch for any more details

Spurn Migration Festival

Been quiet on here due to being busy at Spurn! Currently preparing for the 2nd Migration Festival that will be taking place next weekend. Set to be a very exciting weekend with lots of interesting talks, walks and events taking place! I'll be at Kew in the mornings doing ringing demonstrations and then helping out around Westmere Farm for the rest of the day, hope to see you there.

Details on how to buy tickets here

http://www.ywt.org.uk/events/spurn-migration-festival

Easiest option for accommodation will be camping at Westmere Farm, only £7 per head a night, details on how to get in touch with them here

http://www.westmerefarm.co.uk/default.html

Kolka

Currently in Latvia staying at Kolka Point, its magic!

Keep up to date with what's about here

http://trektellen.nl/trektelling.asp?telpost=889

Also random postings on my Twitter page here

https://twitter.com/TimsBirding

French Ringed Robin

Thrush Nightingale

Adult male Red-breasted Flycatcher

Some highlights!

Spurn 8th-14th

After arriving back from Israel I came through to Spurn on Tuesday 8th, been a decent week, slow at times but plenty of anticipation due to certain rarities further north!

Caught up with plenty of spring migrants, a lifer and 22 new species for Patchwork Challenge 2014!

being-

Blackcap- plenty kicking around now, had 7 in the plum tree at Kew on Thursday feeding on pollen 

3 Goosanders (poss same bird), Brambling flew south, loads of Chiffchaff, plenty of Wheatears, including 3 spring trapped on Clubley's while waiting for the Crag Martin

Handfuls of Sand Martins most days over the weekend flying south with a few Swallows including the first breeders back today, Mistle Thrush over one evening, nice Short-eared Owl kicking about Long Bank, several Whimbrel on the Humber being a nice spring sound, couple of flyover flavas, first singing Willow Warblers, a single Sandwich and Little Terns flying south, 3 Pochards over the sea, a buzzing Tree Pipit, 2 House Martins, a 1w Yellow-legged Gull, Little Ringed Plover and Black-tailed Godwit 'in-off', the British Lifer being 2 Serins, first flying south and dissapearing till couple hours later another/the same flew south into the bushes at the Warren where we thought it was brighter than the first bird which was confirmed when 2 got up and flew north and last one today a cracking male Ring Ouzel.

Serin by Jack Ashton-Booth

Great start and forecast looks promising for the foreseeable future!

Israel

Flew out to Tel-Aviv on 23rd March from Luton and stayed in Eliat at the Little Prince Hostel for 10 nights with Ollie Metcalf, Rael Butcher and James Shergold, until we flew back on the evening of the 2nd April. Birding was mainly done within about 40km of Eliat with further distances being covered to go to Nizzana, upto lake Yeruham on birdrace day and we birded around Lahav just North-East of Be'er Sheva on our way back north, with a failed attempt to get to 

Birding was amazing! Birds everywhere and the grounded migrants just kept coming despite it being a poor year for them! Raptors were good, just a bit hard to get your head around a constant stream of 1000's of Steppe Buzzards!

I've decided to be lazy and talk through the trip using the list of birds that I personally saw while there, Ollie is doing a more day by day diary style blog posts here http://olliesbirding.blogspot.co.uk/

Egyptian Goose- 1 at IBRCE, 4 at K19

Shelduck- upto 10 seen at K20

Mallard- irregular at K20 more frequent further north

Pintail- large flocks off North Beach, sev birds at K20

Teal- plenty at Lake Yeruham, scattered sightings at K20 etc

Garganey- upto 200 off North Beach, upto 10 at various water bodies

Ferruginous Duck- 3 at K19 early on had moved on by end

Tufted Duck- upto 8 at K19 just 1 on birdrace day

Chukar- plenty seen in wadis 40km+ north of Eliat

Sand Partridge- seen regularly, easy in Holland Park several territorial males calling plenty

Quail- any random bit of vegetation! no calling birds

Little Grebe- scattered at water bodies

Brown Booby- single of North Beach seen twice

Cormorant- 1 at IBRCE, 5 at K19 on birdrace

Night Heron- several flocks in evening moving north, 1 at IBRCE, 10+ Lake Yeroham

Striated Heron- single flew across North Beach at dawn

Cattle Egret- occasional at K19 etc

Squacco Heron- common in ditches water bodies etc

Western Reef Heron- single white morph around the ditch at North Beach

Grey Heron- several large flocks moved north and on deck at K20 etc

Purple Heron- scattered birds on deck at K19, Lake Yeruham

White Stork- scattered birds on deck at Yotvata etc some huge migrating flocks at Nizzana and Lahav

Black Stork- never the numbers as Whites, upto 6 moving through with raptors none on the deck

Glossy Ibis- 2 flocks of c20 birds noted through K20, plenty around Ma'agan Michael

Spoonbill- 5 adults at IBRCE/K20

Greater Flamingo- upto 150+ at K20 scattered singles at other saltpans

Griffon Vulture- 40+ at Vulture feeding station near Sde Boker

Egyptian Vulture- 5 different birds through with the raptors in the mountains, c10 at above site

Osprey- about 8 birds seen moving through

Lesser Spotted Eagle- 7 birds moving north one morning and a single on birdrace day

Steppe Eagle- 'commonest' eagle upto 30 moving through in a morning in the mountains

Short-toed Eagle- only about 5 seen moving through

Booted Eagle- 10+ moving north some cracking pale morphs

Black Kite- second most numerous raptor, some interesting eastern looking things

Marsh Harrier- commonest harrier seen daily

Hen Harrier- 3+ seen around Yotvata occasionally

Montagu's Harrier- all 2cy birds at Yotvata, good to see alongside Pallid's

Pallid Harrier- 3 males seen first in mountains about 12 birds in total mainly at Yotvata

Long-legged Buzzard- single went north in with the Steppe's one morning

Steppe Buzzard- 1000's and 1000's seen, constant streams of birds in the mountains!

Sparrowhawk- 1-2 seen most days

Kestrel- fairly common 5-6 most days

Lesser Kestrel- only 1 male as we watched the Caspian Plover, few more female types not easy though!

Hobby- single seen over IBRCE one evening

Water Rail- 1 at IBRCE

Little Crake- upto 3 at Yotvata Sewage Works, 1 at K19 and 3 at Lake Yeruham

Moorhen- scattered around water bodies

Coot- plenty at K19 and Lake Yeruham

Purple Swamphen- 1 seen at Lake Yeruham

Crane- very few actually! young birds on deck at Yotvata and Neot Smadar

Avocet- 1 at IBRCE

Black-winged Stilt- good numbers at most water bodies

Stone Curlew- seen at Nizzana at Yotvata heard at night at several sites

Cream-coloured Courser- cracking flock at Nizzana and random bird at K25 on race day

Collared Pratincole- upto 30 seen at Yotvata/K20-19 towards end of trip

Little Ringed Plover- plenty at K20/Sewage ponds

Ringed Plover- plenty at K20

Kentish Plover- upto 40 at K20

Greater Sandplover- 3 different birds at K20, 1 stonking sum-plum male

Grey Plover- 1 at K20

Caspian Plover- stunning male at Yotvata!

Spur Winged Plover- pretty much anywhere wet or a bit green, on roundabout in Tel-Aviv!

Dunlin- upto 15 at K20

Curlew Sandpiper- 1 at IBRCE

Little Stint- commonest 'small' wader at K20 probably 100+ there at any one time

Wood Sandpiper- low numbers at K20 and various sewage pools

Green Sandpiper- abundant at most water bodies

Common Sandpiper- scattered records at Yotvata/North Beach ditch

Redshank- common at K20, interesting to see spotshank like eastern race birds

Spotted Redshank- 2 at K20

Greenshank- plenty at K20 etc

Marsh Sandpiper- upto 40 at K20

Black-tailed Godwit- flock of 6 and a single limosa at K20

Curlew- single disappointingly short billed at K20 one afternoon

Snipe- couple noted in ditch at K19 etc

Red-necked Phalarope- about 15 seen on and off at K20 as they move through

Ruff- loads everywhere! Flock of 300 at Nizzana sewage pools!

Black-headed Gull- upto about 20 in with Slender Bills at K20

Slender-billed Gull- most abundant gull, 100's at K20

Med Gull- 1 2w at IBRCE

Armenian Gull- 1w on deck at IBRCE, several presumed 2w/3w/ad flying north in evening

Caspian Gull- several 1w moving through with large gulls

Pallas's Gull- 5 1w seen one evening and a single another at IBRCE, awesome!

Baltic Gull- commonest large gulls, plenty of adults moved north in the evening

Heuglin's Gull- second commonest large gull, weird looking first winters!

White-eyed Gull- upto 10 off North Beach in the evening

Sandwich Tern- couple of flocks off North Beach

Gull-billed Tern- singles off North Beach also flock at K20 on deck

Common Tern- present on buoys most of time off North Beach

White-cheeked Tern- 1w off North Beach one morning

Whiskered Tern- single adult around IBRCE

Pin-tailed Sandgrouse- flock of 4 and 12 seen in flight at Nizzana

Crowned Sandgrouse- flock of 6 feeding on ground near Ovda Airport

Lichtenstein's Sandgrouse- 3 then 6 came into drink at K19 2 evenings when dark!

Rock Dove- about

Namaqua Dove- several pairs seen around K19 and Yotvata

Collared Dove- abundant

Turtle Dove- 3 on birdrace day at Yotvata and just north of Sde Boker

Laughing Dove- abundant

Great Spotted Cuckoo- 1 in Holland Park and 2 chasing each other and calling near Lahav, mad call!

Common Swift- low numbers moving through

Pallid Swift- identified birds seen occasionally

Alpine Swift- single from from Ben Gurion on birdrace day

Hoope- normally several seen each day

Ring-necked Parrakeet- plenty in Eliat and Tel Aviv

Common Kingfisher- seen at North Beach and Lake Yeruham

White-throated Kingfisher- several seen from car on drive to Ma'agan Michael then 2 seen well when we stopped

Pied Kingfisher- single several times at North Beach and K19

Bee-eater- started to pick up towards end of trip upto 20 in a flock moving north

Blue-cheeked Bee-Eater- single moved north through K20, making all 3 Bee-Eater sp in 3 minutes!

Little Green Bee-Eater- stunning birds! pairs seen at various locations

Syrian Woodpecker- single female at Lake Yeruham

Wryneck- present in nearly every bit of vegetation around! Mega views in Ofira Park one afternoon

Oriental Skylark- 3 in the southern circular field at Yotvata

Crested Lark- common

Short-toed Lark- regularly seen, flock of 400+ near Ovda airport one evening

Desert Lark- pairs seen at various desert locations

Bimaculated Lark- 2 along birders track at back of K19 one afternoon

Hoopoe Lark- single seen at Yotvata, cracking bird, really striking in flight!

Sand Martin- a few moving through

Crag Martin- single through the mountains

Rock Martin- suprisingly common in low numbers seen in most habitats

Barn Swallow- most abundant hirrundine moving north

Red-rumped Swallow- low numbers mixed in with Barn Swallows

House Martin- several seen

Tawny Pipit- 4-5 seen at a few different sites

Long-billed Pipit- 1 near Lahav

Richard's Pipit- 1 over Vulture Feeding site and at Neot Smadar

Water Pipit- coutelli seen in plenty of locations

Meadow Pipit- occasional in pipits flocks

Tree Pipit- regular moving through and on deck in Ofira Park

Red-throated Pipit- not as common as expected, seen well at Yotvata

White Wagtail- abundant

Yellow Wagtail- plenty around water, variety of races/intergrades, feldegg, supercilliaris, thunbergi, domobrovski, flava/beema?

Citrine Wagtail- about 6 cracking males between Yotvata and K19

Robin- single in a wadi near Sde Boker

Nightingale- increased towards end of trip, upto 4-5 seen most days in last 3-4 days

Rufous Bush Robin- single seen at Neot Smadar Sewage works hoping round with the Wheatears, awesome!

Black Bush Robin- after dipping bird that Ollie found at Yotvata then managed to bump into a few Finns watching a/the bird 25km south! Nice views, bigger than I was expecting!

Bluethroat- good numbers of red spot in most reedy habitats but also in random wadis, couple white spots as well

Redstart- 6-7 seen towards end of trip, no obvious eastern/ehrenberg's

Black Redstart- single at Ben Guirion on birdrace day

Northern Wheatear- common in most habitats

Isabelline Wheatear- common in most habitats

Eastern Black-eared Wheatear- singles in various locations, good numbers at Nizzana, including stunning black and white male

Mourning Wheatear- 10+ seen by road side in the Ramon crator

Hooded Wheatear- 3 (2 male) at Netafim

White-crowned Black Wheatear- 20+ seen in various wadis

Blackstart- cracking birds pretty common, look blue in certain light!

Desert Wheatear- single male at K65 on the 40 upto Sde Boker

Whinchat- only 1 at Pied Bushchat

Siberian Stonechat- 2 fem types at Yotvata on disappointingly only 1 day!

Pied Bushchat- male seen at Neot Smadar twice

Song Thrush- single in a radom date palm near Eliat, 2 around Ben Gurion and Lake Yeruham

Blackbird- plenty around Sde Boker, pretty random to see!

Rock Thrush- awesome male at Avrona Palms where the Black Bush Robin was

Scrub Warbler- plenty seen in desert habitats

Graceful Prinia- common in more lusher areas, nothing graceful about its call/song!

Blackcap- second commonest sylvia

Whitethroat- very few seen

Lesser Whitethroat- commonest migrant by far, loads in any bit of habitat

Eastern Orphean Warbler- several in most wadis with migrants

Sardinian Warbler- 1 at Avrona Palms, 2 up near Sde Boker and Nizzana

Ruppell's Warbler- third commonest sylvia! upto 10 in some of the better wadis

Spectacled Warbler- pair seen in Wadi Nekarot

Subalpine Warbler- about 5 different females, all really pale eastern things!

Sedge Warbler- singles at K19 and Yotvata

Savi's Warbler- singing at Yotvata one morning

Cetti's Warbler- singing at Lake Yeruham

Reed Warbler- plenty singing in reeds

Great Reed Warbler- 2 at Lake Yeruham

Eastern Olivaceous Warbler- plenty seen in various locations

Willow Warbler- single in Holland Park towards end of trip

Wood Warbler- 2 on birdrace day at Lake Yeruham and Kibbutz Sde Boker

Eastern Bonelli's Warbler- cracking little birds fairly common but only 1 calling at Avrona Palms

Chiffchaff- commonest phyllosc

Spotted Flycatcher- single at Kittbutz Sde Boker

Semi-collared Flycatcher- elusive male at Ofira Park took a few days to get decent views of

Great Tit- 2 at Lake Yeruham!!!

Penduline Tit- calling at Lake Yeruham

Southern Grey Shrike- 1 seen well at Nizzana, elegans?

Woodchat Shrike- scattered singles at various different sites

Masked Shrike- commonest shrike (still think Woodchats are better!)

White-spectacled Bulbul- common and annoying varying calls!

Palestine Sunbird- not as abundant as expected seen at Yotvata and Holland Park, males are nice in right light!

Arabian Babbler- cool birds bumped into at quite a few places, bigger than expected!

Jay- distinctive atricapillus race seen around Tel-Aviv

Jackdaw- couple kicking round the Long-billed Pipit site

Hooded Crow- regular north of Mitzpe Ramon

Brown-necked Raven- regular pairs in various locations

House Crow- common around Eliat

Tristram's Starling- saw quite a few in various wadis/mountains and around Eliat

Common Myna- plenty around Tel Aviv

House Sparrow- common everywhere

Spanish Sparrow- probably most abundant bird recorded? Big flocks at Yotvata K19 etc as well as migs moving north

Goldfinch- 2 seen near Ma'gan Michael

Greenfinch- several north of Sde Boker

Serin- lots singing at Long-billed Pipit site

Ortolan Bunting- more seen towards end of trip, quite a few moving north  Hope that wasn't too boring, thought I'd do it a little different, will post about the birdrace day soon! Thats a total of 200 species and 70 lifers!!!! See you there next year!

Pipit

Was at Spurn from Thursday till Tuesday and recorded this pipit on Friday 14th.

(Edited to cut time between calls)

It was flying around the Warren fairly high up then moved off North-west or poss onto the Saltmarsh, but I lost it to view. At the time I thought it sounded a bit different to the usual Rock Pipits so pointed my mic at it recorded a few calls and thought nothing more of it.

Have been looking at it in a bit more detail today now I'm back in Birmingham with my laptop and this is what I've found.

This is what a sonogram (edited to cut time between calls) looks like

That little purple line is what I reckon is roughly in the middle of the calls. I then did the same thing with 6 Water Pipit and 6 Rock Pipit calls taken from Xeno-canto. I made sure to choose call types that were the same as the Spurn bird (flight calls) and that they were the same race i.e. petrosus Rock Pipits from Britain or France and spinoletta Water Pipits from Europe (Poland, Italy and Germany).

Rock Pipits are on the left and Water Pipits on the right

I then worked out the average level (kHz) from the Rock and Water Pipits calls.

Rock Pipits came out at 6.491 kHz (range 6.682-6.109) and Water Pipits at 6.038 kHz (range 6.395-5.727).

The Spurn pipit = 6.095, does this mean its a Water Pipit?

I don't know!

The lowest a Rock Pipit showed up in this test was 6.109 kHz in my very crude test, so does this put the Spurn Pipit outside the range of Rock Pipit and make it a Water?

In Catching the Bug (Sound Approach book) they show a sonogram of Rock and a sonogram of Water. It shows the shape of the calls in the sonogram to be quite different! The Rock Pipit has a steadily rising shape whereas the Water is a lot more up and down or 'rising with modulations' as they say in the book! It seems that from the calls above they vary massively! So wouldn't fancy commenting on the shape of the Spurn pipits call! 

Obviously its a small sample size, but shows that the Spurn pipit is towards the lower end of Rock/Water Pipit calls.

Be interested to hear from a few people that know a lot more than the very little that I do on these birds calls!

Always learning!

Champions of the flyway

Quick post, more to follow in a few weeks!

On Sunday I shall be flying out to Israel where on the 1st April I will be part of a team hoping to record as many bird species as possible in 35hrs. This is the first event of its kinds in Israel and as part of this we are trying to raise funds for Birdlife International and the recipients of this years money raised will be going towards helping prevent the shooting of mainly raptors as they pass through the Batumi bottleneck. Any donation towards this great cause would be greatly received, more information and our teams (the Digital Stringers!) JustGiving page is linked below.

Thanks in advance for any donations


http://www.champions-of-the-flyway.com/digital-stringers/


Once I'm back I shall hopefully be posting lots of pics, recordings and details of what we did and saw out there!

Aves Fox

Not too long ago I noticed quite a few people on Twitter and Facebook posting about an app called Aves Vox. It is an app for iPhones and is basically an easy way to search the Xeno-Canto extensive database of calls and songs.

I downloaded the free version straight away and started having a play, I quickly realised the potential of this app and thought it was good but could be brilliant with just a few little tweaks such as a repeat function (so it could be used when ringing to lure birds in) and an easier form of saving the recordings into lists etc.

So I emailed the creator Max Allan Niklasson suggesting some improvements to the app, but not really expecting a reply! However he emailed back almost straight away and was keen to hear more of my thoughts, several emails later I asked if he could email me when the net update of the app was finished.

Max emailed last night to say that the repeat function and several other changes had now been updated for the app. So this morning I decided to splash out the very reasonable sum of £2.99 for the PRO version of the app.

Having been looking at it today this app is brilliant! (Hence this blogpost!) The potential to download and have ready on your phone pretty much any call or song from Xeno-Canto.

Max has posted a video run through of the app to show some of the features of the app




So using this app you can create a list of species, choose the recordings you want, have them instantly accessible without an internet connection and for ringers there's a repeat function. What more could you want from an app!

There is a free version of the app, but it doesn't have the repeat function and some of the list creating functions aren't the same, I think for £2.99 it's still a bargain!