St Mary's - 8 & 10/10/2022

The BUFF BELLIED PIPT, note the lack of barring on the bird's back

St Mary's is the main island of the Scillies and the most populated and the most cultivated. The place is fairly civilised, a landscape of small fields with hedgerows, small copses, and rougher uncultivated areas. Like all the islands its a magnet for migrating birds, its variety of habitats providing shelter for weary travellers. At six square miles, its a small island, making it an easy place to walk around, any rare birds that turn up are easy to get to.

On the 8th, the first day on the Scillies, we met the group for the first time, And after that we had a quick look around the local area. With Hugh Town being so small, it was easy to get out of, to find bird rich countryside around it. On the low ground just beyond the town was Lower Moors, a large area of marshland, mainly overgrown with reeds, with some tree cover. On a pool, overlooked by a hide, a JACK SNIPE was present. What was strange about this sighting was that the bird was out in the open, not far from where it was being viewed, which for a jack snipe is very rare. This was the best sighting of this species I've ever had, usually I see them in flight, when they've been disturbed by me. The bird was asleep, before waking up and doing some feeding, its distinctive bobbing when it moved was characteristic of the bird. After that we walked to Carreg Dhu community gardens, where a bit of searching got us the first YELLOW BROWED WARBLER of the trip, high up in the trees constantly moving and providing its distinctive two note call.

The 10th of October was the first time to properly look round the island. East of the island in the Porth Hellick area there was a bag of goodies, bird wise. Rarest bird of the day was the BUFF BELLIED PIPIT at Porth Hellick Down, a not particularly exciting bird, but rare, even if brown. It was in a paddock, among a flock of very similar MEADOW PIPTS. The main difference between the two species was that the BBP had no stripes on its back while the mippits did. There was not much difference between the two species and to look at the BBP was not a remarkable bird at all. However it proved to be a magnet for twitchers looking for this rare bird. and this unremarkable pipit brought them in, with a decent crowd looking at it.

While twitching the BBP, news got out that a WRYNECK had been seen nearby. Wrynecks are a small brown woodpecker that used to nest in southern England, before coming extinct in late last century. Now they are scarce birds, every sighting attracting a small twitch. The bird was seen just downhill from the BBP, having shown on some rocks. When we got there it wasn't around, of course, but a brown bird flew out into a gorse clump. Most people, myself included, ignored it saying it wasn't the wryneck. However other people took an interest in the gorse clump, and would you have it, the bird showed, perching on a nearby rock for a while giving great views, before flying off down hill. 

After the wryneck, walking downhill, to Porth Hellic Bay a female REDSTART was seen around a clump of bracken, which was my latest record for the species, and my first for October. Nearby was Porth Hellic Pool a large reed fringed lake overlooked by two hides. Not many wildfowl were present, but three GREENSHANK, and ten COMMON SNIPE were nice records. Nearby walking through the Holy Vale, an area of overgrown wet woodland, part of Higher Moors wetlands, a PIED FLYCATCHER was seen in a clearing and like the previous redstart my latest and first October record for the species.

COMMON ROSEFINCH in Hugh Town Allotments

Aside from the Porth Hellick area, things were fairly quiet. Being an island, even built up places can hold migrants. A COMMON ROSEFINCH was found in Hugh Town Allotments, along with a WHITETHROAT, and one of  a small number of BLACKCAPS seen on the island. The rosefinch had been seen in a tree, but had become elusive but after a while the bird flew out to briefly expose itself in the open, looking a bit like a chaffinch I guess. 

Being October there was a steady trickle of SWALLOWS migrating, a bird which has become rare in Suffolk, with a few HOUSE MARTINS, and even a few SAND MARTINS passing though, again my latest records for the latter species and my first for October. Aside from that a SANDWICH TERN was in Porth Loo Bay, this big tern is one of the first migrants to arrive and one of the last to leave, making the most of the English summer.

Porth Loo Beach

One small area, Porth Hellic proved to be a fertile area for sightings, which happens, when a lot of birders are concentrated in one place, meaning there's more coverage, more eyes searching the countryside, and as a result something else that's rare usually gets found. However aside from that the island was fairly quiet, and a lot of walking didn't produce much. It just seems that there are few birds around at the moment, probably a result of massive declines in their populations, with the sad truth that our countryside is just getting quieter and more empty.

Tresco - 9/10/2022

RED SQUIRREL

Although St Mary's is seen as the main island in the Scillies, the most populated and cultivated, Tresco runs that island a close second. The island is famous for its garden, which being on a birdwatching holiday I didn't visit, but also for its ability to attract rare birds. Another avian draw is the population of GOLDEN PHASANTS, which live in its conifer plantations, the last wild birds left in the UK.

Our first full day on the Scillies, led us to our first off island excursion, specifically to see the SWAINSON'S THRUSH that had been hanging round for a couple of days. A small bird, it looks like a song thrush, and this little bird is quite a mega - a very rare bird to the UK, with maybe one record a year for the entire country. It originates from America, so what its doing on the Scillies is anyone's guess, maybe blown here, or got lost, but sadly will end up dying here. Its the sort of bird that attracts twitches, but has been in the area for a couple of days already, so people are already blasé.

The Meridian, the ferry boat to Tresco

Expecting something more, the ferry boat was quite a surprise, a little passenger boat, rammed full of people who were mainly twitchers. The boat journey was swift, maybe fifteen minutes, the islands are close in together and the passage was fairly calm. The boat landed at a desolate pier, and it was a strange walk along a tarmac track through rough grassland, kind of following the other boat passengers. Looking down on a bay, a MEDITERRANEAN GULL was of interest. The desolate landscape softened gradually until signs of civilisation appeared with an airfield. In a close by field, cropped short, there was a goody bag of birds. In among a large flock of MEADOW PIPITS, was a WHINCHAT and a WHEATEAR, the whinchat particularly good as its my latest ever record, the first for October. The large amounts of rough grassland on Tresco meant that STONECHATS were common, as they were over the entire islands, one of the few birds to be doing well at the moment.

Great Pool

The first signs of habitation was the Abbey Gardens, but as we weren't going in we took a detour, round it, passed Abbey pool, a small lake, where two BLACK TAILED GODWITS were a good sighting for the islands. Perhaps the main habitat feature of Tresco is the Great Pool, a large lake that almost cuts the island in half, the main body of water on the entire set of islands. It is a large lake, reed fringed and looked over by two hides. On the water there was a small flock of GADWALL and COOT with TEAL on the fringes. With the drought we've been having, some mud had become exposed,, where a CURLEW SANDPIPER was a good find, while a WATER RAIL was also about, attracted out from the reeds, running down the side of the lake, while finally two BLACK TAILED GODWITS were here, different to the ones on Abbey Pool.

Great Pool from one of the hides

With no room in the tiny hide overlooking Great Pool, some of the party had split off. My party was in Old Grimsby, when the call came out that the SWAINSON'S THRUSH that had  been in the area, but had been lost, had been refound. The news got out to other birders in the area, and there was a mass rush uphill to where the bird had been found. It wasn't there immediately, but had been seen in a palm tree, in a small quarry,  before flying off into some bracken, where it had disappeared.

Twitch for the Swainson's Thrush

There was a hush as around thrity people waited beneath a palm tree waiting to get a sight of an elusive rare thrush. Cameras and binocluars were raised at every brief flicker of wind, every birder anticipating the bird showing itself. Doubts were rampant as to whether the bird was still about, or if it had gone to ground in the surrounding dense scrub. Some people walked up the road, but most waited. And then there was a movement, a bird flew into the palm tree, binoculars and cameras were raised, and lo! the bird appeared for a  brief time, then moved out of view, before appearing again, for maybe thirty seconds, but good views were got. And that's all that mattered.

It wasn't a looker, the same plumage as a song thrush, except it had no striping on the breast, and it was small, the size of a robin. And that was it, but that was all that mattered, a tick, a sighting. Like a football match you don't necessarily go for the score, but to enjoy the atmosphere, which good twitches always supply, no matter the result. Twitches are always a good event, people are always friendly, and that is often what its all about. However this bird was a lifer, a bird I have never seen before, a bird I can tick off my list.

GOLDEN PHEASANT

After the twitch a group of us went to the south of the island to the large alien conifer woodlands, to look for one special bird of Tresco, the GOLDEN PHEASANT. This bird is a native of the Far East, but some birds were introduced to this country, for some reason, and self sustaining colonies were established, with the result it became accepted as part of the British bird list, which means it was officially classed as wild. However over the years most of these populations died off, with the result that Tresco is the last place in the country in which they survive, the last place where you can add them to your list.

We only found the one bird, a stunning male, mostly red with a golden crown, a very gaudy bird that seemed so out of place in the British countryside, over plumaged like a mandarin duck. The bird was very comfortable with us and allowed us to get very close, within a couple of metres. This strange bird was a lifer, one I have never seen before. There was a population in Thetford Forest but they died out around the millennium. On the way back, we passed they Abbey Gardens where a RED SQUIRREL ran across the road in front of us. A small population of this rare mammal has been introduced to Tresco to provide a viable population in the south of England where it is now extinct. After that it was a walk to New Grimsby, to take the ferry boat back to St Mary's, after a very satisfying day.

The second day of my holiday in the Scillies, and a good one. The problem with birding holidays is that the first couple of  days can be intense, you see a lot of birds, and then things peter out by day three or four. Only time would tell if that happened on this holiday, but two lifers wasn't bad.

Travelling to the Scillies -6,7 & 8 October

One of the COMMON DOLPHINS following the boat - photo by Andy Crawford

The most annoying thing about the Scillies is how difficult they are to get to. Distant islands far off the Cornish coast are a remote destination to a boy from Ipswich. To get all the way to them meant travelling a long, long way, both difficult and time consuming. If you're a conscientious traveller like myself, and don't want to drive and instead taking public transport, then it can be very difficult. The sheer number of things to take into account is bewildering. Another factor to throw into it all was the annoying hassle of train strikes, which happened on the 6 and 7 of October. That meant the journey I would have completed in one day by train, was now split into two when having to take a coach. Even in the 21st century, a time when we should be having holidays on the moon, things are slow. We have not advanced for fifty years at least.

London Victoria

The first day was the easiest, a journey from Ipswich to London. Because I had an early morning coach journey on Friday 7, I got a coach the day before to Victoria on the 6th. On that night, in London, I got a "pod" in a local easyhotel. With not much to do I walked the streets, of the area, Vicotria and Chelsea and I got a RING NECKED PARAKEET for my effort, a first for the year, and a real London specialty. There is a pair in Ipswich but I managed to miss them this year.

St Michael's Mount

Friday loomed, which meant a ten jour coach journey down to Penzance. Now this seems really, really long, and it was, but it really did take that amount of time to get there. Getting out of London, we hit RED KITE country, there were simply loads, I'm not used t that sight in Suffolk, but it'll soon get that way. It took five hours to get to Plymouth, straight down the motorways where we stopped for half an hour. It then took another four and a half hours to travel to Penzance, going through all the windy Cornish lanes, and old towns not made for coaches. Along the way several RAVENS were of interest, again a bird that has exploded in population but is still scarce in Suffolk. When I eventually arrived into Penzance, tired and bored, I stayed at Hotel Penzance, which was cozy, but unbelievably hot.

The Scillonian III, the boat to the Scillies

Onwards to the third day of travel, it probably would have been quicker in the 19th century. An early morning dawned, as the sun rose behind St Michael's Mount, getting up early to get the ferry, the Scillionian III, which left early at 9:15. Thankfully, the sea was as still as a millpond which made the journey hassle free. On the boat, the majority of tourists were birdwatchers, dressed in greens and browns, with a pair of binoculars and maybe a telescope for those more dedicated. Like me they were heading to the fabled lands of the Scillies, on the hope of capturing that epic lifer. It also meant bird watching was good from the boat, as there were many eyes, and there was usually someone shouting out what was seen.

A younger DOLPHIN in the pod - photo by Andy Crawford

With the water so calm it was a good time to observe the sea birds, ones that had left the mainland to spend the winter out at sea. Numbers weren't particularly high but there was a good variety. Of note were a pair of POMARINE SKUAS, one a pale bellied the other dark, and a pair of MANX SHEARWATERS kept pace with the boat for a while. A single tiny GREY PHALAROPE was left behind in the ship's wake, a little dot in the great ocean. The most numerous bird was the GANNET, such a majestic bird, and the sight of them dive bombing into the sea is a something I can never get tired of. There were big flocks of GUILLEMOTS and a single PUFFIN was of interest, as its my first ever October record. A single male EIDER was seen at Penzance, where TURNSTONES and ROCK PIPITS were seen in the harbour.

Photo by Andy Crawford

Although the birds were good  the most exciting sightings were the several pods of COMMON DOLPHINS, breaking the waves, with several jumping fully out of the water, easily seen from the boat. There was a shout of 'minke whale!' but I didn't see it.

A SHAG drying it wings, they were a common bird on the shores of the Islands

The Scillies came into view, gradually, with some people pointing out the garrison, with plenty of SHAGS drying themselves on the rocks. We arrived at Hugh Town, the main town on the Scillies at midday, and the weather was absolutely gorgeous, like a summer's day, shorts weather even, it felt like an English paradise. Collecting baggage dumped on the quayside, I made my way to the guesthouse, a walk to the edge of town, ten minutes at most. Arriving at the guest house I had to stop to admire the views from the there which looked across the circular, boat strewn bay to the main part of Hugh Town, a view that was breathtaking.

The view from the guesthouse across the bay to Hugh Town

The guesthouse was called the Mincarlo and things were pretty laid back, there was no one to greet us and we just let ourselves in.  I had a nice little single bed with again great views from the little window. We all met up at half three to finally see who was with us on the trip. It was a pretty decent group of people, but as per the rules of my blog I will now write about people, only about birds, the countryside, just nature in general. 

A rather confusing statue on the cliffs above the guesthouse

So all the hard work was over, and now I was on the Scillies, I could finally relax and just enjoy the holiday, which I did, very much. Be prepared for some very thorough posts of my trip to these fabled isles later on.

The Isles of Scilly - 6-16/10/2022

GOLDEN PHEASANT on Tresco

There are certain areas of the country that are legendary for birdwacthing, places like the Suffolk and North Norfolk Coast, but there are few places that are so fabled as the Scillies, a mythical place to visit, especially in October. The roll call of rarities that pour into the islands makes anyone with an interest in birds salivate in the mouth. The Isles of Scilly just seems to attract the unusual more than anywhere else in the UK. So where better to spend a week's birding in October 2022 than those famous islands. And boy were they good.

Porth Loo  Beach

The Isles of Scilly are situated off southern Cornwall, a two and a half hour boat journey from Penzance on the mainland, and being outlying islands attract the unusual birds. Rare birds turn up due to difficulties in their Autumn migration, strong winds blowing them off course or just getting lost, and so they end up on these islands somehow or other. Being so far off land, lying so far south and west, they attract birds not seen on the mainland, birds that might get lost at sea, often American. The Scillies are small and sparsely populated, a group of islands that huddle close to each other, the distance between them short. The islands are small, only a couple of miles long, so are easy to get around, walking roads and footpaths, the distance between things short. Places are not far from each other and in many cases areas where there are birds follow on to other ones, making it handy to do several twitches in one day, even making it easy to travel to other islands fairly rapidly for a mega twitch.

The dock at St Agnes

Being my first time and travelling myself, I decided to go through a tour company, Birdfinders, run by Vaughan and Svetlana. This was a new company for me, so I was a bit concerned, but I liked the style, things were laidback and fairly easy going. A lot of tour operators are rigid, you go out and do this and this without any change, but with Birdfinders anyone could leave and do whatever they want. There were around ten people joining me in the tour and for a change there were people of my age in the group, not so many of the grey brigade, some coming back to the island, others like me arriving for the first time. It made for a good atmosphere, something different from my more usual, lonely birding, so unusual to share this strange past time with other people. It was also good to get some expert knowledge of the islands, Vaughan and Svetlana were well known birders there, to actually know where the places were and more importantly where to find the birds.

Hugh Town

It took me a couple of days to get to and from the islands, its a hard place to get to, especially with train strikes, believe me. I stayed there for a week from the 8/10 to 15/10, staying in Hugh Town on St Mary's, going to the islands of Tresco twice and St Agnes and Bryher once. St Mary's is the main island, more populated and cultivated, with mainly small grassy fields bordered by hedgerows, the other islands are rougher and wilder, less kept by man. Hugh Town is the largest settlement, where the ferry alights, a small settlement that winds around a circular bay. Its a delightful place, small, with maybe a thousands people, but is handy, with a bank, a post office, a coop, several pubs and some tourist shops. I stayed in a guest house called the Mincarlo, which had absolutely amazing views across the boat strewn bay to the other side of the town, which in the brilliant light reminded me of something more exotic. The islands feel like something different to what you usually expect of the UK, they are almost like a different country in some respects, yet at the same time there is a comfortable familiarity of being around British people.

What happens to unguarded cakes in the Scillies

Another reason the Scillies attract so many birds is that the islands offers up plenty of habitat to find the birds in, a mix of favourable countryside that attracts a good range of species. As is happening with the rest of the country bird numbers were low, there just aren't that many birds left in the countryside to migrate to other countrysides, big flocks of birds are becoming things of the past. On the plus side certain species were very common. HOUSE SPARROWS and STARLINGS were present in huge flocks at times, especially around habitation, villages and towns, kind of giving the idea of what numbers used to be like on the mainland in the distant past, before their populations crashed there. At Longstone Café sparrows were a real pest, with a large flock pestering you, nipping at any unguarded cakes, swooping down like vultures on any scraps fed out to them. BLACKBIRDS and SONG THRUSHES were also present in good numbers, both resident and migrants, and the flight of a ROBIN often got me excited, dreaming of rarer birds than the little red breast. However in general there weren't any big flocks, birds were usually present in ones or twos, a sad indictment of the state of our countryside.

A twitch for a TWO BARRED GREENISH WARBLER that never was

Being such a magnet for rare birds, there were plenty of birdwatchers on the islands, outnumbering any other tourist by a great deal. When a rare bird turned up there was a "twitch" where birders flock together to tick off another rarity, and there were a few of them on the Scillies. Many people like me came over for the week, and a lot of the time the same people turned up to each twitch and you got to know a lot of the birdwatchers on the island. Rarest bird for me this week was a BLACKBURNIAN WARBLER, an American stunner, only the fifth for the country and the first for England, which brought out a huge crowd over several days. Other lifers included SWAINSON'S THRUSH, GOLDEN PHEASANT, BUFF BELLIED PIPIT and WILSON'S SNIPE, some pretty rare birds, coming from all over the world, all ending up on the Scillies for whatever reasons (although the pheasants were introduced, but still count).

Dock at Tresco

Quite surprisingly, the terrain of the islands were mainly undulating without being hilly, but there were lots of walks uphill, which after a long day got irritating. St Mary's was the most civilised of the islands with a lot of small pastureland broken up by small hedgerows, a pleasant landscape, without being particularly remarkable. In the lowlands there were wetlands, providing good birding, particularly Higher Moors and Lower Moors (only a short walk from Hugh Town) on St Mary's, and Great Pool on Tresco, a large lake that's brought in the birds. On the remoter islands things were less cultivated, much wilder, and as a result there were large stretches of rough grassland, lots of areas of bracken, open country, where birds lurked in the scattered bushes. Also around the islands there was plenty of wooded cover, especially on Tresco (although it was mainly hostile pine plantation), and because of the warm climate a lot of the vegetation (especially on St Mary's) was comprised of non native succulents, introduced from South Africa. Around the edges of the islands, the shoreline was rocky and uninviting, with small sandy beaches, but there were no estuaries or mudflats, so wader numbers were limited.

Visiting the islands in October the mainly marine environment meant that the weather was often a mixed bag, changing daily, often hourly, something you could never predict. When I first landed on the islands it was like a summer's day, it felt like beach weather, and it felt so glorious to have finally set foot on such hallowed birdwatching grounds. For the rest of the trip the weather stayed fairly mellow, but on Tresco I once got caught out in a heavy rain storm, and got completely drenched, deciding it was a good idea to go out on an exposed walk on the north of the island, one of those soakings where everything got wet (my poor phone gave up the ghost after that). At the end of the stay waiting for the return ferry, some people told me that it stays so warm right into December, a place so unlike the rest of the UK, a completely unique place. I'm sad to leave it behind.

This post was a brief introduction to the Islands, if you would like a more detailed description, please read further posts. Its going to take a long time to write this blog, but its a labour of love and I will enjoy every moment, reliving the time I was out in the Scillies.

Martlesham Creek - 1/10/2022

GREENSHANK and a BLACK HEADED GULL

Occasionally even the most lonesome of birdwatchers needs company and so today I joined a group activity, a collective birdwatch at Martlesham Creek. Group birdwatching is a different activity to the lonely one. Groups work at a much slower pace, you end up standing in places for a long while, and where the individual would crave quiet, with more people there is a quiet chatter.  Under the guise of the Suffolk Bird Group, this morning was a saunter around a nice section of the Deben estuary. Martlesham Creek branches off the main river estuary and provides good views of waders, and the occasional osprey, and although there were none of the latter, there were plenty of  wading birds to see.

The marina on the Creek

Being an estuary WADERS were the order of the day, and although numbers weren't high there was plenty of variety. The tide was very low on the estuary, providing lots of mud to attract the wading birds, and with the Creek being narrow in places, birds were quite close. On the first stretch, the very end of the Creek, coming out by the small marina, two SPOTTED REDSHANK, were around, now moulted out of their jet black summer plumage, more grey and white now, more elegant than the COMMON REDSHANK, the most numerous wader on the creek. A RUFF was present as well, and there were several GREENSHANK, a bird that was found in decent numbers along the Creek. Further along the Creek, there were small numbers of GREY PLOVER, BLACKTAILED GODWIT and CURLEW in singles along the tidal edge. Where the Creek ended and joined the main body of the Deben, two RINGED PLOVER were on the mud, but we were strangely missing common birds like dunlin today. 

SPOTTED REDSHANK

Apart from waders, there were small numbers of other water birds about. A KINGFISHER was a brief bullet of sapphire, flying across the river wall to land in a dyke the other side, where small numbers of REED BUNTING flitted about among the reeds. LITTLE GREBES were plentiful, little round shapes in the main channel, while small numbers of TEAL were pretty much the only DUCKS around. By the marina there was a small herd of MUTE SWAN, resting on the edge of the channel, and there were a few LITTLE EGRETS stalking the shallow water.

The Red House where the Creek meets the main Deben river

So not a great deal seen in total, but plenty enough to keep a party of birdwatchers interested. I don't know how many more group days out I'll attend, most of them are on a Sunday when I have to work, so there wont be any for a while. But maybe, when there is a suitable Saturday, and when I'm feeling sociable again, I'll attend another outing.