Dawlish Warren


My main birdwatching trip during the week's holiday in Devon was to Dawlish Warren, where I was hoping to find the Roseate Tern. Being July, I wasn't expecting too much, but it ended up being a really productive trip.

I hadn't realised that for over a year now the path to the bird hide has been closed due to erosion, turning a walk which was formerly quite short into a much longer slog along the beach. 
You now have to walk along the path to Groyne 10 and then along the beach to Groyne 18 and then round and back on yourself to the hide. This probably doubles the length of the walk. We had timed our trip so as to reach the hide around high tide and didn't have time to do the new walk.

We therefore feared the visit was over before it had even begun, but decided to make the best of the situation and scope the Bight from the dune-top path level with Groyne 10, just before the path is closed.
This turned out to be more successful than we expected and I quickly picked up one of the Roseate Terns among a larger group of Common & Sandwich Terns. I got another birder onto the bird, and we watched it for around an hour, getting surprisingly good views. 

This poor digiscoped effort does not do justice to the views we had, but some of the ID features like the blue-grey mantle and dark beak can be seen

During this time we scanned the sea for a while and picked up Gannet, Common Scoter and Kittiwake among others. There were large numbers of Mediterranean Gulls in the Bight, which are still a big novelty for a Midlands birder. As are Sanderling, a small group of which were running about on the shore between Groynes 10 & 11. We watched these for a while, as they are truly one of my favourite species to watch as they run about in front of the waves.

On the walk through the dunes between the visitor centre and our viewing point we were lucky enough to see lots of Cirl Buntings which seem to have had a very successful year of breeding. At least 2 fledglings were being fed by adult birds. This was a really special opportunity to watch one of Britain's rarest birds, and definitely it challenged the Roseate for the bird of the day.

We also took a day trip to Exmoor, in particular the area around Simonsbath where we saw Siskin, Coal Tit, Nuthatch, Kingfisher and a nice juvenile Dipper on the river. 

We also drove around the Exe to the popular seaside town of Salcombe. It was our first time in this area and the views were breathtaking. Birdwatching took a backseat here, but I did spot a large group of Mediterranean Gulls resting on the estuary, which gave me a chance to test the zoom on the P900!





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