Snape - 25/12/2019

With some time off for Christmas, I took the trip up to Snape to spend some time with the family. On the day, whilst the dinner was being cooked, I had some time to visit various nearby reserves to build up an appetite.

WIGEON and TEAL at high tide

 



Hazelwood Marshes
The tide was fully in, the first time I have ever seen it so, covering the whole of the marshes with a layer of water. There were still plenty of DUCKS about, mainly TEAL, WIGEON and SHELDUCK, with smaller numbers of PINTAIL further out, seen from the hide. However there were few WADERS about, as there was little habitat for them. GREAT CRESTED GREBES were present on the deeper channels, where they can fish.

High tide view from the hide at Hazelwood

 

On the walk to the hide two WATER PIPITS were about, told about by their monosyllabic call (just a one note call). From the hide a KINGFISHER was seen to fly into a dead tree, briefly posing before flying away.
As I walked back a MARSH HARRIER put some of the ducks to flight.

Snape Marshes & Snape Warren
After Hazelwood I went to have a look at the reserves immediately around Snape. Walking along the river bank, Snape Marshes had a lot of water, where a small flock of CURLEW probed the mud. Again it was high tide, this time there were several LITTLE GREBES in the main river channel.
On the marshes a male STONECHAT posed on a fence post, while there were plenty of REED BUNTINGS, in the reeds around the ditches.

View of the Alde river

 



After the river bank I moved to higher ground and the heaths of Snape Warren. It was fairly quiet, desolate even, except for a pair of DARTFORD WARBLERS, making up for what they lack in size, by the noise they made.


So a nice little morning's bird watching, Snape is one of those places where there is so much bird habitat within a small area, its easy to see a lot without much effort.

 

 

 

If your reading this before new year, have a good one and may you see many more birds in the future. As long as places like these are still protected, then maybe our birds will continue to thrive.

BLACK THROATED DIVER, Suffolk Water Park - 28/12/2019

Suffolk Water Park is one of those local patches, the nearest lake to where I live, a fairly quiet place. So it came as a surprise to come across a BLACK THROATED DIVER there on a Saturday afternoon. It was situated sort of in the middle of the lake drifting round, not doing much.
I was talking to some of the fisherman, some who were knowledgeable about birds, and they said the diver had been there for a couple of days. It hadn't been advertised, it had been kept a secret, because fishermen are rarely welcoming to non fisher folk like birders.

This is a really mega sighting for the area, this species of diver is scarce in Suffolk, and being a coastal bird extremely rare inland. I was wondering if this is the first record for the area, ever, but some old timer told me there was a record here a long time ago.

 

 

 

Suffolk Water Park is a large lake, used for fishing and forms part of a golf course. It is tree and reed fringed giving it a natural look, even though its man made. At the moment there are small numbers of GREAT CRESTED GREBE, TUFTED DUCK and COOT present. Occasionally the odd GADWALL turns up and on the 9/11 a male GOLDENEYE was present, so its not really the kind of place you would expect to hold anything special.

 

 

TUFTIES and a GREAT CRESTED GREBE

 

In summer, its a fairly productive place with around five pairs of GREBE nesting, around four pairs of COOT and a pair of SWANS, so its the best lake for breeding water birds in the area.

 

So that's why its important to continuously check your local patch, because occasionally something good might just show up, and it makes all that effort worthwhile.

 

 

 

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Abberton Reservoir & Fingringhoe Wick - 18/12/2019

 

Where do you go when you have exhausted all the bird reserves in Suffolk? You head down to Essex. Our southern neighbour has some great reserves. Sure it doesn't have the reedbeds or heathland like Suffolk, but it has lots of other wetlands, reservoirs, grazing marsh and tidal estuaries. It was to a reservoir that I would go to today, Abberton Reservoir, one of the largest and best in the country.

 

 GREAT WHITE EGRET

 

Reservoirs like Abberton are absent in Suffolk. Yes there is Alton Water (see some of my blogs)  but there is no comparison between the two places bird wise. However like Alton Water, Abberton is difficult to view. Abberton is a ginormous reservoir with vast numbers of wildfowl, but the only viewing is from the small reserve, a little promenantory into the water, and two causeways, Layer-de-la-Haye and Layer Breton. 

 

 The GREAT WHITE EGRET are noticeably taller than the HERONS

 

To emphasise the sheer scale of wildfowl at Abberton, in the bay next to the visitors centre there was roughly two and a half thousand TEAL. That's quite a lot of duck, they made a large concentration, many black dots on the water. Amongst them was a large raft of POCHARD and TUFTED DUCK, with smaller numbers of GOOSANDER. More excitingly there were also two LONG TAILED DUCK just off the concentration. Now this sea faring duck is rare inland, more akin to the coasts of Scotland like the Moray Firth than inland Essex. 

As I was watching them a MARSH HARRIER flew over, causing a bit of commotion, but ducks have learnt to not fear this raptor.

 

 Male GOLDENEYE amongst female TUFTIES
 

On the main reservoir, ducks were mainly in small flocks, of single figure, the species most represented were GOLDENEYE, there must have been several hundred present. Large rafts of duck were seen in the distance but due to the vastness of the water I couldn't tell what they were, even through a telescope. It was almost like an inland sea.

Male TUFTED DUCK

 



Hide Bay was another area looked over from the nature reserve. Although duck numbers here were fairly low, what it did have were an amazing ten GREAT WHITE EGRET. This is the largest concentration I have ever see of this species, and provided some great photo opportunities. I was really worried that with the vastness of the reservoir, there would be no nearby birds to photograph, but little did I have to worry when this species was present.
Also amongst them was a tiny GREEN SANDPIPER, it was so small it seemed like one of the egrets would tread on him.

Male and female GOOSANDER. They breed in northern rivers, wintering south on reservoirs like Abberton

 



The reserve at Abberton is fairly new, with recently planted trees, so there wasn't very much birdwise, except a flock of FIELDFARES. A large amount of trees have been planted so in fifty years it will be great for birds, a shame I doubt I will live to see it. Recent construction work has resulted in the old concrete banks being removed to reveal muddy margins which has greatly enhanced wildfowl numbers. One of the few times where development has benefitted wildlife.

Some of the many TEAL

 



Layer-de-la-Haye causeway looked over the visitor centre bay, providing a different angle to the vast flock of ducks found there. On the otherside of the causeway was a flock of around a hundred SHOVELLER as if just to emphasise how many birds were present.
Layer Breton causeway is much further south. Here the landscape is more natural, with trees and reeds providing the surroundings. Numbers of ducks here were much smaller with nothing out of the ordinary, what you would expect from a normal body of water.

 

 

Fingringhoe Wick

 

Fingringhoe is a nice little Essex Wildlife Trust reserve, a quarry overgrown with scrub that provides views over the tidal River Colne. Having spent a long time at Abberton, I only had an hour to spend here, needing to beat the rush hour traffic home.

 



 The view of the mudflats from Robbie's Hide

 

I concentrated on the more southern hides which provided the best views over the mudflats. The tide was coming in quick, and there was only a small amount of mud exposed. Most noticeable was a flock of around 500 KNOT packed tightly into the water's edge. There were also flocks of DUNLIN, as well as single CURLEW, BLACKWIT, GREY PLOVER and OYSTERCATCHER amongst them. There were few duck, some SHELDUCK, WIGEON, whilst a small flock of BRENT GEESE flew north. On the river, on the deeper water were several RED BREASTED MERGANSER.

The light became pretty terrible at Fingringhoe, so this was the best I could get.

 

From Crawshaw Hide, overlooking a little scrape in the saltmarsh, I saw a WATER RAIL, as usual the bird was very nervy about being even slightly out in the open and was only viewed a few times, seen through the reeds.

I visited Crawashaw, Geedon Bay and Robbie's hides. After visiting those hides, rather than head north, I walked the inner part of the reserve, through a mixture of scrub and young woodland, round the lakes at the centre of the reserve. Out on the lakes there wasn't much apart from small numbers of the usual ducks.

As I returned to the car the water had completely covered the mud flats the power of natural forces at work.

 

So a rare visit over the border to Essex really came up trumps, with some decent birds on show today. As always there's not enough time, especially in winter, to visit them properly. There are a lot of good reserves in Essex, lots of birds to see, so I recommend a visit sometime.

Lackford Lakes & Micklemere - 13/12/2019

I always enjoy a trip over to Lackford. Ok so it doesn't have the rare birds or any amount of rare landscape, but its a great place for photography, probably the best reserve in Suffolk to capture a picture. There is the Stump, an old tree trunk where well positioned droppings of bird seed attracts birds within inches of your camera. In general the birds on this reserve are well used to people, and are not afraid to pose for a picture.

Guess what this animal is

 



It was a fairly dull day with poor lighting as I arrived at the reserve. Having a coffee at the visitors centre, watching the feeders, there were a couple of MARSH and COAL TITS amongst the commoner birds.

LONG TAILED TIT. These birds are great, they form large flocks in winter and are little bundles of energy, when other birds are hunkering down.

 



Moving out onto the reserve, there is the Winter hide that overlooks the Sailing Lake. This area of water was full of birds, in the end it would be the lake that had the most present. The bird in the largest numbers were GADWALL, with several hundred present, this reserve holds some of the largest numbers in Suffolk. Present in smaller numbers were TUFTED DUCK, WIGEON, POCHARD and COOT. For these species it has been a poor winter so far. The fairly mild winter we have endured has meant a lot of birds are still hanging around in Europe, and haven't been pushed further west to the UK.
As I left the hide there was a TREECREEPER amongst a tit flock in the poplars.

 LAPWING on the Slough.

 

The path skirted the Sailing Lake and made its way to the Slough, another lake. The most obvious birds here were the LAPWING, forming a flock of around a hundred birds, which never managed to settle, always alighting in the air at any opportunity. Water levels were high which reflected in low duck numbers with few present, mainly being TEAL.

 LAPWING are very jittery, and go to flight very easily, as other species stay on the ground.

 

KINGFISHERS were seen at various points on the reserve, although they were only observed in flight, as a bullet of blue whizzing past a hide, someone calling out "Kingfisher!" as it did so. They were seen on the Sailing Lake, the Slough and Hawker's  Pool. There weren't any birds posing for photos today, you know the ones that win photography awards.

 Female BLACKBIRD

 

Passed the Slough, on towards the Eastern Lakes, is the Stump. Its in an area of wet woodland, which has a good selection of birds. The Stump was good today. This remains of a fallen tree is where people regularly place food, to lure birds down to feed and so get great photo opportunities.

 DUNNOCK

 

As soon as I put some bird seed down, the usual culprits turned up, as if by instinct they know there was going to be food. First there was a ROBIN, then a BLACKBIRD, then a DUNNOCK.

 Male BLACKBIRD

 

The blackbirds, being the largest birds, bossed every other bird about. There was a male and a female present. Some BLUE TITS turned up, and then a beautiful NUTHATCH, with its pastel blue and ochre plumage. This is, strangely, a hard bird to find in eastern Suffolk, but is more common out here in the west of the county.

 NUTHATCH

 

Some MARSH TITS turned up. These are fairly understated, compared to similar species, but are quite scarce, needing ancient or wet woodland, and like most woodland birds are declining in numbers.

ROBIN 

Having got some decent photos I decided to move onto the Eastern Lakes. These bodies of water are five large lakes, that in the right conditions can be quite good for birds. However, today these lakes were fairly quiet. Some TUFTED DUCK, COOT and GADWALL, were all present in low numbers.
Probably the best birds were five GOLDENEYES, four males and one female spread about.

 Male GOLDENEYE

 

Between Mill Deep and Long Reach a large flock of fifty SISKIN were present feeding on the lakeside alders.

 Cobb (male) SWAN

A walk back to the car park, and Lackford was done with, a steady visit, with the usual wintering birds seen, but some good photographs made up for it.

Micklemere

With some time left I decided to go over to Micklemere which was fairly close. This is an area of flooded grassland, in a fairly dry area, and therefore attracts some good birds. The only point of access is via a hide which looks out on the reserve, so is not really the place for those looking for a hike.

 GREYLAG GEESE

 

Today the reserve was fairly quiet, except for a large flock of GREYLAG GEESE. 30 MALLARD, 25 WIGEON, 10 TEAL and a handful of SHOVELLER and GADWALL were all that was present. However with a lot of flooding elsewhere there might be less need for birds to use the reserve.

 

So it ended up being one of those days where you hope to see something, but don't quite, its always a gamble coming to these reserves. As I have stated I enjoy coming out here, getting to basics and reaffirming my love of birdwatching. Its just good to have these places to go to in the first place.

Ring Necked Parakeets, Ipswich cemetery - Dec 2019

 

 

I heard them long before I could see them, an exotic chirping that identified the birds I was looking for. In the old cemetery of Ipswich, amongst centuries old tombstones and statues of weeping angels, I came upon some of Ipswich's newest residents. Four RING NECKED PARAKEETS, perched on a tree and surprisingly hard to finally see. However they didn't stay long and flew off into the distance.

 

 

I started my search for the parakeets on a nice sunny morning. The light on Weds 4 Dec was amazing, at around nine o'clock, the golden hour, a low sun cast deep shadows through the gravestones. Winter thrushes were abundant, despite it being a poor year, it was so peaceful, easy to forget that this was in an urban area.

Ring necked parakeets are common in London, numbering in the thousands, and is easy to come across in many of the city's parks, but is not normally found in Ipswich. Rumour had it that Jimi Hendrix released some, but a recent article on the BBC website disputed this. Another rumour is that some were released from Pinewood Studios, after the finishing of the filming of the African Queen in the 1950s. Wherever they came from they are here to stay, for good or bad.

 

The simple question is do we want them to expand here, in Ipswich? They are a pest, and they outcompete native wildlife. So there is that dreaded word in conservation: cull. Be sure this was never the bird's fault, it is human's. But these birds spread like wildfire when given the chance, and although it will give some exoticness to Suffolk wildlife, something spectacular, is it really worth it?

 

Minsmere - 28/11/2019

Following a very wet November, large parts of the river valleys of Suffolk were flooded, huge areas of farmland inundated by water. On my way to Minsmere today I passed miles and miles of this natural process. With all that flooding all of a sudden all this new habitat became available to waterbirds to feed in. As a result it was no surprise that the Scrape was quiet, with numbers in the hundreds rather than the thousands as the birds had left to pastures new. It also meant that the Levels, the area of wet grassland to the south of the Scrape, was flooded, the first time for a couple of years. It was here that the most ducks were found on the reserve, with large numbers of GADWALL and SHOVELLER.

Female COMMON SCOTER. The images appear dark because of the poor light conditions today.

 



Star duck today was the female COMMON SCOTER on East Scrape. This is a common sea duck, they can be seen from the beach at Minsmere, but are usually just a black speck on the horizon. This bird was the closest I have ever seen of this species, and it provided good photography oppurtunities.

Male TEAL

 

Female TEAL

 



Despite it being Winter, usually the poorest time of year for them, there were several  WADERS about. 14 AVOCETS on South Scrape, 14 BLACKWITS East Scrape, 14 SNIPE East Scrape, with 2 more at Island Mere and 4 TURNSTONE on South Scrape, made up the numbers.

Two SNIPE at Island Mere

 



On South Scrape, someone in the hide identified a CASPIAN GULL. Now I'm ok with GULLS, but when it comes to HERRING, YELLOW LEGGED and CASPIAN, I always have trouble. Those three forms are all different species of HERRING GULL, and they all look very familiar, not to mention all the differing plumages of the varies stages of age. But the guy in the hide seemed confident so I'm counting it.

 

Over the reed beds there were three MARSH HARRIER, not many, as this bird disperses over the winter month, with only a small number left around at this time of year.

 SHOVELLER and MALLARD, East Scrape

 

Small-bird wise this was a good day for November. Star bird was a FIRECREST, seen in a tit flock near the visitors centre.
Six BULLFINCHES were at North Bushes, with another one amongst a tit flock near the car park. A few REDWINGS were also in North Bushes, of note because its been a lean year for thrushes. There was only one STONECHAT on the beach, for what is usually a good spot for them, perched on a gorse branch.

 Management work was being undertaken by North Hide. Reeds had been cut immediately in front of the hide in preparation for nesting lapwing next spring.

 

 

BEARDED TITS were very active, with small flocks seen in the reeds between South Scrape and East Scrape, and at Island Mere. Also amongst the reeds, CETTI'S WARBLERS were tentatively starting to sing, testament to the mild winter so far. 
Around the car park there was a small flock of SISKIN, and a MARSH TIT was on the feeders by the café.

 

So a decent day for November, usually one of the quieter months of the year. Although it was a miserable day there was still a lot of birds about. With not many people around it was very peaceful, a really good place to relax and gain some food for the soul. On a day like this who can ever feel depressed.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Shingle Street, Hollesley Marshes & Hollesley Heath

With winter gradually arriving I thought it would be nice to explore some of the lesser known places of the Suffolk coast. So shying away from the main reserves I chose some more obscure places to visit, in the hope they might turn up something unusual, something not looked for, not the expected, the wildcards. So I chose a small area of South Suffolk, where an assortment of nature reserves provided the opportunity to find some decent bids.

Shingle Street
This place is literally a hamlet built on the edge of the beach. Unlike a large number of  places on the Suffolk Coast that are eroding rapidly, the beaches of Shingle Street are actually increasing, with many new spits forming into the sea as the water deposits shingle from further up the coast. Wild and remote, there are no nearby settlements, Shingle Street is a true frontier place.

Martello Tower in the mud. Lots of these forts litter the Suffolk Coast, created over the years to protect us from French invasion.

 



The place is well known, locally, for its overwintering OWLS, mainly SHORT EARED, that hunt the large areas of rough grassland. I have seen them here before (see an old blog dated 2016) but alas I didn't see any today.
Shingle Street really took the brunt of a strong easterly wind, straight in from Siberia. That really kept everything down and the only birds of note were a flock of twenty COMMON SCOTER on the very choppy sea.

Hollesley Marshes
Having drawn a blank at Shingle Street I went a short way up the coast to Hollesley Marshes. This place can be hit or miss, as a lot of times they drain the scrape here for some reason. Today, thankfully, there was water, and there were a few birds about.

Close shots of birds were hard to come by today

 

This November has seen fairly low numbers of wildfowl as mild weather on the continent has meant they have lingered there and have not been forced over to this country. This may mean that it will be a couple of months before we see decent numbers of ducks over here. The largest number of duck present were of WIGEON, but most of the commoner species were represented, including a few PINTAIL.
Sheep were grazing the grassy edges of the scrape, in preparation for breeding waders of next spring, where lapwing and redshank will nest. A HARE briefly appeared on the path, before clocking me and scarpering off. But all in all it was very quiet really.

Hollesley Heath
As the coastal marshes see an increase in bird numbers over the winter, the heaths see a decline outside of the breeding season. As a result this habitat can be very quiet in winter as birds disperse away. And it was true today of Hollesley, a large area of heath managed by the Suffolk Wildlife Trust, the largest block of Sandlings heath outside of the Minsmere area.

Hollesley Heath is a complex of heath and pine plantations

 



The only birds of note were a STONECHAT and a DARTFORD WARBLER, nothing unusual in that, they are common on the heaths. But what was unusual was the way they were acting. I was once told, when you see a stonechat you will see a Dartford warbler. That was true of today. The two birds were acting together, as if in a way they were best buddies, moving together as they flew over the heather. The stonechat sat atop the heather whilst the Dartford flew around. They were always together. This isn't something learnt, they don't live long enough, but shows some kind of relationship between species that nest in the same habitat, like they complement each other, through something built into them. It was fascinating.

Birdwatching away from the main reserves can be a gamble, sometimes you strike gold, most of the time you don't. What's so good about the Suffolk coast is that there are so many good places to go, so many top notch birding places, that if you're unlucky at one place there will always be another place where there will be birds. You can really spend a life time exploring this area of the country.

 

 

 

Dingle Marshes - 13/11/2019

With the holiday to Hawaii now well and truly over, and after some needed recuperation, it was time to go back to bird watching in good old blighty. November can be a quiet month, autumn migration is over and winter is only beginning. There wasn't much at the usual reserves - only one place stood out: EASTERN YELLOW WAGTAIL at Dingle Marshes.
Now I'm not one for a twitch, hanging around in the cold for hours waiting to get a brief view of some nondescript bird. But I haven't been to Dingle Marshes for ages, this was a good excuse to go, and anyway its a good place for watching birds other than this rarity.

The twitch seen from the other side of Corporation Marshes

 



Dingle Marshes is only a small part of a huge complex of reserves, spanning large areas of reedbed, heathland and forest, which attracts lots of birds. However it is also in danger of being inundated by the sea, a natural process and not one that anyone can do anything about.

The rare bird was found in Corporation Marshes, an area of saltmarsh where Dingle Marshes meets the vast reedbed at Walberswick. There were around fifteen people present, not bad considering that the bird had been there for a couple of days and it was a Wednesday. The news was that the bird had not been seen for several hours. As we waited for the bird to reappear, astonishingly a WESTERN YELLOW WAGTAIL showed itself. This is our British form of the species, this one was extremely late, they are summer visitors that usually leaves by mid-Septemeber, so it was a great find.
On a patch of grass on the beach behind the twitch, someone had put out bird seed and this attracted a flock of SNOW BUNTINGS, eight in total. It gave us a break from hanging around looking for the rarity, and gave some good photo opportunities.

Eventually the EASTERN YELLOW WAGTAIL showed itself, it looked like our yellow wagtails, but was a bit browner, there was nothing about its plumage to really emphasise its exoticness.

The low landscape of Dingle Marshes used to be grazing marsh, but with the constant inundations by the sea had been allowed to grow wild into reedbed. There are a few pools, on which was a GREAT WHITE EGRET, towering over its little cousin, the aptly named LITTLE EGRET, its huge yellow bill unmistakable.
Ducks are not particularly found in large numbers at Dingle, with around a hundred present on the pools, mainly TEAL, with some WIGEON, SHOVELLER and GADWALL.

Feeding on the beach, amongst all the flotsam was a large flock of 30 GREENFINCH and 10 LINNET. SKYLARKS were everywhere in large numbers and seem to be preparing for the spring. In the large reedbeds at Walberswick BEARDED TITS and REED BUNTINGS were found, as you would expect.
So a good return to Britain at a good reserve I haven't been to in ages. A trip out here in any month can reveal a lot, especially if you combine it with the vast Walberswich reserve. Its a more low key place to the similar Minsmere, no hides, no visitors centre and only public footpaths, but if you find the right places the reserve can reveal a lot. A walk from Dunwich beach to Southwold and back although very long, is a real must for any visiting bird watcher, the best examples of the many habitats in the Suffolk Coast and Heaths area.