Review of the year, and plan for the next

Visit Mark Fellowes Nature Photography

So - made it to the end of the year in one piece, with just odd elements of sanity left by the wayside. This is my one hundredth post in 2009, mainly covering birding trips throughout the UK, but also including leading my annual field-trip to Java and Borneo, which is always spectacular.

Highlights:
Over 200 species seen in the year, which considering the constraints on my time is pretty good going. Using the Birdguides definition (well I've got to base it on something...), I've seen a few megas (interesting how this bit of slang is used nowhere else these days) - white-throated sparrow (Old Winchester Hill), black-winged pratincole (Stodmarsh), brown shrike (Staines Moor) and the dodgy hooded merganser (Radipole) and a rarity (still, in spite of this year's invasion) with the pair of glossy ibis (Dungeness). On top of that some scarce species - spotted crake (London Wetland Centre), ring-necked duck (Frithend Sand Pit), stone curlew, red-backed shrike, cattle and great white egret (all at Dungeness), two great grey shrikes (Ash Ranges and Wishmoor Bottom), spoonbill (Lodmoor), white-winged black tern (Staines Reservoirs) and American wigeon (Lower Farm Gravel Pits).

Black-winged pratincole


Brown shrike


Hooded merganser


White-throated sparrow


Glossy ibis


Favourite moments?
Lots! Unexpectedly finding a singing firecrest at the Devil's Punchbowl, the stone curlew flying in off the sea at Dungeness, and the pair of glossy ibises landing in front of me after so much trying, watching barn owls hunting in daylight at several locations, merlin and hen harrier at local heaths, and the spectacular flight of enormous flocks of pink-footed geese over Snettisham at dusk, hawfinch at Bookham Common, a flock of twite at Holkham, and a year book-ended by great grey shrikes, both within 10 minutes of home.

Moments to forget?
No point in raking things over, but that tsunami of midges at Staines Reservoirs, lugging the camera to the white-winged black tern and discovering that I'd forgotten to load a memory card as it performed perfectly, not getting to the red deer rut and continuous dipping on penduline tits (something like five times, and before them waxwing and glossy ibis). Regrets - not going to Cornwall to see the snowy owl. It was a snowy owl! Well worth £80 of petrol and cramp from driving all day.

So - what will keep me going next year? Having a year list was a real motivator, making me go and see species and (more importantly places) I'd not visited before. But in 2010, rather than just start another year list, I've decided to have two targets. First - my new year's resolution is to get to know my local sites much better. I've defined my home range as anything within my local 10km square (see the map). This isn't centred, as large areas nearby are out of bounds either permanently (Pirbright Ranges), or for the majority of the year (Ash Ranges) as they are MoD land. At the same time, the local heaths may not be of that high standard, but I should still pick up some local specialities such as Dartford warbler, woodlark and tree pipit.

My local(ish!) patch:


There are also a series of places I just don't know at all, which is pretty poor considering how local they are, but I've tended to go a little further for decent sites. Papercourt marshes and gravel pits should be my most regular local wetland, so I hope that I won't be completely lacking in passage waders and wintering ducks. There are decent patches of woodland and farmland too. As a target? No idea to be honest, but 80 species seems reasonable. This isn't something I'll hold myself to, but I do want to get to know my own area better. I also need to complete my tetrads for the breeding atlas, so this is my excuse to focus on what's on my doorstep, rather than further afield.

Second, and relying again on Birdguides, I've decided that I need to try to get all of the 'common' species I'd missed out on in 2009 (7 - dipper, turtle dove, brambling, red-crested pochard, guillemot, common scoter and willow tit), and then 23 others on the list of regular but less well distributed species that I've missed out in 2009. These include sea-birds such as all the auks, shearwaters, lots of sandpipers (purple, curlew, wood) and some of the less common gulls. The one thing they have in common? Location, location, location. All were missed out (with the exceptions of brambling and red-crested pochard, and maybe turtle dove) as they'll require more than a few miles driving to get to the right locations to find them. Looking for 30 species in addition to the over 200 seen in 2010 seems difficult (especially as I plan to do more local birding nearer home), but not impossible.

So there we are - some targets to keep me motivated. I've realised that this is a very bird orientated review, which to some extent reflects what I've been up to this year, and this has been a change in focus from the more general wildlife photography I've been pursuing over the past few years. Time to go exploring and see where I end up in 2010!

Happy New Year!

Easily distracted...

Visit Mark Fellowes Nature Photography

Stuck in front of the computer, trying to get some work done, but made the mistake of looking out the window and getting distracted by the house sparrows (Passer domesticus; click for larger). A moment of decent light and I take a couple of shots through the (fairly filthy!) study window, before settling back to the screen. We still have decent populations of house sparrows here - long may it last!

Weir Wood Reservoir, East Sussex

Visit Mark Fellowes Nature Photography

An early morning Boxing Day trip before everyone else got out of bed proved interesting (in the sense that I got to visit somewhere new) and wet (in the sense that it poured with rain all morning). Weir Wood is a large reservoir over the border in East Sussex and the west end is an excellent local nature reserve, with a hide. The hide was the saviour of the day - at least I managed to stay dry while scanning the water. There was little unusual around - a scattering of pochard and tufted duck, a few mandarins and mallard, and the odd gull or cormorant were on show. The rain prevented a decent exploration, but a well placed set of feeders brought things closer, with good numbers of blue (Cyanites caeruleus), marsh (Poecile palustris) and great (Parus major; click any image for larger) tits allowing a few shots in the rain. The light was appalling, so I was pleased to get anything, and marsh tits are pretty uncommon closer to home so it's always good to come across decent numbers of these.

Ash Ranges, Surrey

Visit Mark Fellowes Nature Photography

Another freezing cold day, but blue skies made for a good afternoon on Ash Ranges. I decided today to get a few more landscape images of the Ranges, as well as the hope of coming across the great grey shrike again. There was no sign of the shrike, but a few Dartford warblers, a very surprising little egret flying over with intent (not exactly a species I would have expected over Surrey heathland) and a small flock of crossbills (Loxia curvirostra; click for larger). The distinctive calls of crossbill allow them to be picked out at a distance. These individuals were not hanging around, alighting briefly allowing a record shot, unfortunately into the light.

The light however, was superb, with the first two images taken from the top of Crown Prince Hill, showing just how spectacular this location is. Not typical Surrey by any stretch of the imagination...


Wandering back down as the sun set, the remaining light was incredibly atmospheric. The crescent moon hung over this dead tree, and I liked the way the remaining light caught the snow in the foreground. In the background I could hear the roosting flock of tits again, now joined by some long-tailed tits. In total there must be something like 100 birds roosting together. By this time my hands had stopped working - handling a metal-bodied camera saps heat from your fingers instantly!

A day of two halves

Visit Mark Fellowes Nature Photography

Another cold day, and I headed to the Basingstoke canal and onwards up through Sheet's Heath. The canal was frozen over, with the one open patch home to a dozen mallards. The adjacent woodland was busy with coal, great (Parus major; click for larger) and blue tits, blackbirds, robins and wrens, as well as jays, great spotted woodpeckers, and a range of finches. The heath itself was still covered in patchy snow, and the minor highlight here was a small flock of redwings at the top of a birch tree. I have now given up hope for the Dartford warblers for this year - I'd hoped that there may have been some juvenile dispersal repopulating the heath after February's disaster, but I imagine that there is plenty of open patches available in premium areas.



After lunch I then took a long wander on Ash Ranges, mainly with the aim of getting a decent shot of a Dartford warbler where I'd seen one at dusk yesterday. No luck, but after 10 minutes or so I found a great grey shrike (Lanius excubitor; click for larger) - now that made up for the cold! I caught it from the corner of my eye flying low over the heather, and it perched on a dead tree trunk near the top of Bridge Hill. I got a few record shots, but the shrike wasn't hanging around - it headed off over Romping Downs. I was chuffed at getting the first finding (or at least the first reported sighting) this winter of what is probably the same bird present last year, and a better view this time around than I managed with that shrike - even if I did get superb views of the Wishmoor Bottom bird.



There was nothing startling during the rest of the afternoon, but there was interest provided by a decent flock of lesser redpoll, a couple of Dartford warblers, and also a huge flock of blue tits (Cyanistes caeruleus; click for larger), with at least 50 birds (and I wouldn't be surprised at over 70), plus up to 20 great and coal tits, which flew into a couple of trees. A small flock of golden plover, and later a couple of dozen lapwings, flew over, adding to the day's total. So - a quiet morning with lots of common species, and a freezing afternoon with fewer species, but including a great grey shrike - not bad hey?!

Ash Ranges, Surrey

Visit Mark Fellowes Nature Photography

Ash Ranges is usually shut to the public, but over the Christmas and New Year the army leaves and the public has freedom to roam. Today was the first open day for this year's holiday season. Last winter we had great grey shrike and hen harrier, and all this just a five minutes from home, so regular visits are mandatory! The freezing weather meant that the snow from a couple of days ago remained on the ground over wide areas and I spent a couple of hours wandering over the heathland, until the sun went down. In all that time, I saw a family about a mile away, and later passed two dog walkers - not bad for a Saturday afternoon in Surrey.



Heathland is one of those habitats where you don't necessarily see that much, but what you see can be interesting. Today was fairly quiet, with 30 or so species seen before the sun started to sink. I'd brought the wrong lens for landscapes, but I had little else to point the lens at, so these will have to do...



The highlights were a pair of crossbills flying over, and a couple of dartford warblers (Sylvia undata; click for larger), including this silhouetted individual seen after the sun had gone down.

London Wetland Centre, Barnes

Visit Mark Fellowes Nature Photography

Today was primarily a photography day, rather than a birding day, so no hunting for the bittern, water pipit or mealy redpoll, all seen at the Wetland Centre today. On the bird front, the highlights were a pair of pintail and a shelduck. Instead, I chose to spend the morning trying for some decent images of common species. The light wasn't too bad in parts, where the watery winter light gave way to sunnier patches.

This robin (Erithacus rubecula; click any image for larger) was preening near the sheltered lagoon and allowed a close approach.







In contrast, this wren (Troglodytes troglodytes; click for larger) popped out and allowed a single snap shot.



Moorhen (Gallinula chloropus; click any image for larger) can be difficult to deal with in bright light - the contrast between the whites (difficult not to blow) and near blacks (difficult to keep detail in) is a challenge.







Tufted duck (Aythya fuligula; click any image for larger) present the same problem.





Finally, this Egyptian goose (Alopochen aegyptiacus; click for larger) was exercising its wings, and I liked the contrast between the detail of the head and the pattern of the flexed wings.

Lavell's Lake, Berkshire

Visit Mark Fellowes Nature Photography

A quick 30 minutes at Lavell's (which I've just discovered has a nice new website) to stretch my legs and get some fresh air. There was little unexpected around - there were good numbers of pochard, wigeon and teal, and a water rail scurried through the reeds.

The water levels are very high (images taken with mobile phone; click for larger) suggesting, just as last year, the usual Lavell's bitterns will stick to other areas of Dinton Pastures. A few passerines were visiting the feeders, and there was a small group of redwings in the hedgerows, and a wintering chiffchaff called near the brook.

Dungeness, Kent

Visit Mark Fellowes Nature Photography

Being stubborn (or slightly more pejoratively, pig-headed), on booking a day off I decided to head back to Dungeness for one more hunt for the glossy ibises. I arrived before sun up, parked by the ARC pit and headed over towards Boulderwall Farm to see if my luck was in. A flock of tree sparrows flew over as I scanned the field from the road, but no sign. I moved on up the road to where a slight rise afforded a good view over the water and pasture, and from the left, in flew the ibises, landing about a 100 yards away. The light was poor and so I'd left the camera in the car, but the view was superb. They preened for a couple of minutes before disappearing off again. No matter what the rest of the day held, it was worth it. I was especially keen given that these are among the last few of the great glossy ibis invasion of the autumn of 2009. I'd guess that at least 50 juvenile birds arrived, probably from Spain, in a number of small flocks which spread throughout the country. It's not clear why they dispersed north post-breeding, but they did, I had finally managed to see them.

Elated, I headed to the ARC hide to see what was about. The light was still poor (all shots were taken at ISO 800), but there was a good range of species present on the spits (click for larger), and a pair of Bewick's swans (Cygnus columbianus; click for larger) out on the open water. A yellow-legged gull was picked out in the distance by someone else in the hide, and there was a scattering of interesting waders (golden plover, black-tailed godwit) among the usual ducks.





There was no sign of the penduline tits (these are now my official bogey bird after five attempts to see them this year - both here and at Rainham), and I moved to the end of the willow trail in case they were feeding in the reedmace, but there was no sign of them. A wintering chiffchaff was the only species of note.

As I walked along the trail a hunting marsh harrier (Circus aeruginosus; click for larger) got everything up.



I moved to the main reserve, stopping at Boulderwall Farm again, where the glossy ibises (Plegadis falcinellus; click for larger) were feeding a few hundred yards away. The views weren't as good as earlier, but at least I got a few record shots. Glossy ibis is also my 200th species of the year - so I'd hit my target with a species I'd really wanted to catch up with in the UK.





I moved around the main reserve, checking each of the pits. My next target was smew, for which Dungeness is perhaps the premier location in the UK, with up to 20 wintering. After a lot of hunting, I eventually found a distant redhead. On the way around I came close to a kestrel (Falco tinnunculus; click for larger), but most birds were keeping their heads down in the chill wind.



While I missed the bittern from the Denge hide, the great white egret (Ardea alba; click for larger) hunted in the distance, and a small group of black-necked grebe (Podiceps nigricollis) and a couple of ruddy ducks (Oxyura jamaicensis; click for larger) bobbed in the choppy water.





The rest of the day was relatively quiet. I headed to the power station on the off chance of a wintering black redstart, or a snow bunting, but all that was around was the usual gulls and cormorants. Stopping off back at the ARC didn't turn anything new, apart from a squealling water rail and a sparrowhawk zipping past my ear. I waited as the light (such as it was) faded in case the penduline tits showed, but no luck. The only other notable addition was a tawny owl flying across the motorway on the way home. In spite of the poor photography conditions it was an excellent day - the glossy ibises were well worth the effort!