Midlands Birding Blog

In the middle of winter, during those long, often birdless, walks around our patch with few more species on our list than there were at the end of New Years' Day, we could all do with a bit of motivation. A reminder that anything can happen in birding, even things that seem scarcely believable. I spend a lot of time in Devon and one of my favourite areas is the Axe Estuary. On the 4th of August 2016, I was down for a week on holiday and, being 20 minutes away, decided to go to Black Hole Marsh on the Axe Estuary to see the Least Sandpiper which had been found 2 days previously. The bird was performing outrageously well from the screens at the base of the hide walkway. Far too close for scopes and close enough that I could get this photo with a phone camera: I've seen plenty of Least Sandpipers in the USA but even there, I have never seen one so close. It gave a great opportunity to study the plumage details. Who knew I'd have to employ them so soon? After getting ...

With an end to restricted travel getting closer every day, I'm sure everyone reading this is keen to get out and spread their birding wings. I know I certainly I am. But to avoid you wishing away these next few weeks or months, my post this week is going to be a series of 'Low Carbon Birding Challenges', to make the most of our local birding scene before we can all travel further afield, and before some of us forget about the spots that we've grown to love over the last year. A Lockdown Birding Bucket List Top 10 if you will.  Hopefully, it might help us to rekindle our love for our local area, a love which might have worn quite thin over the last few months of being forced to visit it exclusively every day! I hope this highlights a few positives that we can take away from this past year of enforced local lockdown birding, and maybe some that we can continue to enjoy after lockdown and beyond. If there are any you haven't done already, there's still time to give...

Something that’s always been difficult for me has been finding the line between listing and watching, between enjoying a rare bird and appreciating what I see every day. It’s something you might call the Birder's Paradox - how can I truly enjoy a rare bird if I forget to enjoy those that are more common? I started to think about what birds symbolise 'home' to me. What birds do I see every day and often forget to give a second glance.  Back home in Leicestershire, this might be the birds on the garden feeder - the Goldfinches, for example - along with House Sparrows and Blackbirds. In my uni house in Bath, larger birds are the main cast - Herring, Lesser-black Backed and Black-headed Gulls are everywhere. Cormorants are common and there's always a Pied Wagtail on the road outside. It struck me how different these were. A Goldfinch in the single tree that I can see from my Bath apartment would be a breath of fresh air, and I find myself celebrating a garden Pied Wagtail b...

When you plan an autumn trip to Norfolk months in advance, you can never count on good conditions. The chances are that you won't get them. So back in August, when I booked a 4 day trip to Norfolk from the 18th to the 21st of September, I was counting on a great trip full of resident specialities, lingering summer breeders and a few early arriving winter visitors which would make for a long trip list. Besides, Cranes, Bitterns, Bearded Tits and Spoonbills are more than enough to keep me happy even in the worst migration conditions. But as the days went by, I couldn't help but start to glance at the winds on Windy.com. And there they were - easterlies - starting a few days before the trip and continuing until the 21st. I didn't let myself get excited; after all, forecasts can be (and often are) wrong, with the winds all to often swinging back round to SW at the last minute just as you've got your hopes up. But this time my hopes were realised. To say that we were lucky w...

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 ...

It's been 3 weeks now since my first ever rare find - or rare possible-find - whatever that may be called!  On the 4th of June, after a long and exciting day in Nottinghamshire and Yorkshire , my dad and I called in at Thorne Moors at 18:00, hoping to get to 100 for the day. What we weren't expecting was a rarity! Parking on the road in Moorends, we set off down the Grange Road access track. The vastness of this site soon became apparent; in fact, we walked for at least of 2km before we even got to the moor. We’d clearly come to the wrong place to add waders to our list, or at least the wrong place to find them in a short walk! The moor at Thorne Moors - around 2km from the Grange Road parking Walking through the small area of woodland after the information board before the main moor itself, I heard a strange song coming from quite deep in the trees, behind an area of deep water. It sounded like a Chiffchaff singing its notes in the wrong order. I pointed it out to my dad. Cont...

I'd been planning this day for a while. A big trip through Nottinghamshire and Yorkshire to look for some birds I never normally see (namely Puffin, Turtle Dove, Razorbill etc.), and maybe even a few lifers. Being on a UK list of 253, getting a lifer that isn't a rarity is a rare thing for me nowadays. The possibility of Woodlark and Honey Buzzard in Sherwood Forest was an exciting prospect. As was the chance of reaching 100 birds in a day, something I've only achieved once before in the UK (101 in Norfolk in January 2019).  Tree Sparrows are actually an unusual bird for me - we saw many at Bempton though Major Oak is around 1000 years old! So, on the 4th of June we undertook it. Granted the time of year for a big day list isn't ideal but I always have exams during late April/May and birding from sunrise to sunset isn't conducive to productive revision!  Waking at 05:00 it was just getting light, and the birding began. The first stop was Sherwood Forest and we were ...

Most birders will probably admit their birding is a fine line between a hobby and an obsession. The listing bug is so easy to catch! I've definitely strayed more towards twitching recently. Lately though, I've tried to resist the urge and focus my listing temptations elsewhere. I've decided my favourite thing is self-finding birds - nothing can beat the excitement. I know, this is far easier said than done. Every twitcher would prefer to find the bird themselves! It is so much harder, the rewards are so much more elusive and, perhaps most of all, the rules are so much greyer. I tried to make my own self-found list - something I could count and something I could try to improve. It wasn't easy. That is, until I found Punk Birder's rules. Self-finding always makes sightings so much better, such as this surprise Spoonbill on my patch in June 2017 I was late to the party, and these rules have been around for ages, but to me they were a revelation. If you haven...