That's dedication!

Despite having only been back in the country for less than three hours, despite having been travelling for over 30 hours with virtually no sleep and despite the sleet, icy winds and a temperature of only 3 degrees centigrade I still went down to the patch this afternoon to look for a reported green-winged teal. How's that for dedication?

The Yankee teal wasn't at Druridge, seemingly it was on Chevington's south pool.

The cold conditions of Druridge came as a bit of a shock having just spent the last two weeks on a birding trip to Sri Lanka, with an average daytime of temperature of around 30 degrees.

Singing Indian pitta in Kitugula Forest

We had an excellent trip, seeing all of the 33 endemic species of bird and most of the sought-after near endemics as well as good selection of mammals including several Asian leopard.

I've got the long dark nights of February to play around with photos and I will, eventually, post a full report and photos on my birding trips blog.

In the meantime, I'll be checking the Budge fields for the green-winged teal. No new species were seen today, but the drake pintail were showing well in front of the hide. My camera was still packed.....