This morning I had to go car shopping, which I hate, but needs must. I got a call from Dave Elliott to say he'd been watching a kingfisher on the Budge fields - but, and here's the crippler, he watched it fly off over the dunes. It's probably six or seven years since my last patch kingfisher.
This evening I had wander around the patch, making the most of the best of the day. I was investigating a strange call I couldn't identify near the reedbed end of the big pool when I got a cryptic tweet from Alan Tilmouth:
Was he referring to the kingfisher? Bit late in the day for that so I phoned him. NO, not the kingfisher, even worse.
Seemingly, a 'photographer from Morpeth' had photographed a crake on Friday at Druridge, hadn't identified so sent it to the County recorder, who did...SPOTTED CRAKE!
Bugger it!
Spotted crake isn't a new bird for the patch, but I've only ever seen two and they were eons ago.
To be honest, I'm getting a bit fed-up with photographers who can't identify birds in the field, so rely on their photos to identify the species later at home.
My ruined night was made a little better as I watched a short-eared owl hunting through the dunes and saw common tern and fulmar offshore as well as a harbour porpoise.
I still have no idea what was calling near the path. It wasn't a spotted crake.
101 lesser black-bagged gull
102 common tern
103 fulmar
Bugger it!
Spotted crake isn't a new bird for the patch, but I've only ever seen two and they were eons ago.
To be honest, I'm getting a bit fed-up with photographers who can't identify birds in the field, so rely on their photos to identify the species later at home.
My ruined night was made a little better as I watched a short-eared owl hunting through the dunes and saw common tern and fulmar offshore as well as a harbour porpoise.
I still have no idea what was calling near the path. It wasn't a spotted crake.
101 lesser black-bagged gull
102 common tern
103 fulmar
7 blackwit 2 nite budge
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