The Colour Purple

No, don't worry, this is not a book review although I do thoroughly recommend Alice Walker's novels.

I had been wanting to see purple sandpipers for a while, so about a week ago, when the weather forecast seemed ok (emphasis on "seemed" as it turned out - there was no sun and it was freezing; nothing new there!), we popped down to Shoreham. We first stopped off at Widewater Lagoon, where I wanted to photograph the red-breasted mergansers. No sign of them. No snow buntings either this winter, shame!

A couple of turnstones were roosting on the beach, a kestrel was hovering and a little egret was posing for a few seconds before flying off. Lots of little grebes were on the lagoon and that was pretty much all that was about apart from the usual gulls and mallards.

Not sure what to make of me and my camera...turnstone.

 

Beautiful male kestrel looking for a meal.

Little egret looking stunning in the sunshine.

 

I briefly scanned the sea and spotted a large flock of common scoter, my first. I don't own a scope and always leave my bins at home (my cam & lens are about as much weight as I can carry!) so sea-watching isn't really something I can do with a 400mm lens. Anyhow, watching the scoters bobbing up and down on the water and then taking off was great!

Common scoter taking off.

We then moved on the Shoreham Harbour, a place we had not visited before, and checked out the old Fort briefly (too many dog walkers but I'm sure wheatears love it when they stop off during migration).

 Great black-backed gull...a huge bird and very impressive in flight.

The tide was in and we immediately spotted 4-5 purple sandpipers feeding at the bottom of the wooden pier. A bit distant but unmistakable. Yay! Another first, I love seeing 'new' birds, it's always so fascinating. It then got even better. Two 'purplies' flew across the water and landed about 20 feet away from us.

Perfect views without disturbing the birds while they were feeding, probing the ground with their long bills. I love waders and purple sandpipers are absolutely beautiful!

 

My favourite shot:

 I hope I'll soon have another encounter with these lovely little birds.

Climping / Pulborough Brooks

....and so it continues. We went to Climping the other day - no wheatears. Got home and had a look online: Climping sightings of the day included 9 wheatears and 2 black redstarts, one male about 200 yards up the road from where we were - for its second day. Why wasn't it reported the day before then maybe we could have seen it too... and a whinchat was also seen in the morning...another bird that I tried to find in vain last autumn. Never seen one! So you'll understand why I might just feel a LITTLE annoyed.

I guess we just need to stop looking for a specific species and it'll turn up when we least expect it. Oh, and of course I did lose the photos I took the other day. No idea why but the files were all damaged and could not be recovered after my card reader died on me. Very annyoing! I had some really nice shots of grey plovers and a little egret in flight and several of a male green woodpecker. Oh well...

OK I bet you've had enough of the whining now and rightly so! Let's move on to the birds that we did see at Climping. I really like sanderlings and there were a lot of them about.

A beautiful male kestrel was hovering above us and a joy to watch.

The highlight were a pair of ringed plover and I managed to get better records shot this time. Impossible to get close to, the birds didn't seem to like people and I obviously didn't want them to get stressed out. So I watched from a distance. These little waders are just SO cute! :)

Ringed plover

Well camouflaged...

We then decided to move on to Pulborough Brooks for a late afternoon stroll around the reserve. It was beautiful!

The sun was shining and there were birds and bird song all around us. Spring has definitely sprung now!

Chiffchaff

Dunnocks, robins, chaffinches, greenfinches, blackbirds and songthrushes were all in full song...it just sounded wonderful!

A male dunnock, happy to be photographed while singing to the ladies

A male chiffchaff perched and sang in a bush right in front of us. Lovely! I manged to take a nice shot of him - definitely one of my best chiffchaff photos! Such beautiful little birds.

We then spotted FIVE blackcaps (the first of the year too!), four of which were males pursuing and singing to one female.

Male blackcap singing Imagine the song of four blackcaps together...amazing! On the way back to the car park a couple of fieldfares flew over - I was surprised they haven't left yet.

So the resident birdies at Pulborough (and the return of the first few warblers) made up for the earlier disappointment! Rarer migrants are special, of course and I'm still hoping to see wheatear, black redstart, whinchat etc. but I do love all of the 'common' birds that I can watch and get to know through the seasons. Not long now and the whitethroats (I LOVE whitethroats!) and nightingales will be back. Can't wait! :)

Pagham Harbour

We had a nice sunny day birding at Pagham today. I really wanted to see a wheatear but unfortunatley, yet again, there weren't any to be found anywhere. A few were seen in the area a few days ago... but not by me!
Anyhow, when we arrived at Church Norton, the 'pigeon' perched in a tree turned out to be a male kestrel and I managed to get a few shots before it flew off.

Male kestrel

The tide was coming in so there weren't many waders on the beach.

There was a chiffchaff hunting flies in the reeds (by the second Severals) and a Cetti's warbler was singing.

Chiffchaff with insect prey

Two chaffinches were fighting and a linnet was perched in a bush, preening. On the ground, I spotted my first peacock butterfly of the year.

Peacock butterfly

We then moved on to Pagham Spit, again hoping to find wheatears. A skylark was singing above us and two ringed plovers were in front of the hide, along with some turnstones. Unfortunately, before we had even entered the hide to get some better views, they all flew off. So I only got a couple of record shots of the ringed plover. Beautiful little birds!

Ringed plover

Two female scaups were on Pagham lagoon (too far away for any decent shots though), along with a great crested grebe, a coot and quite a few black-headed gulls (couldn't find a Mediterranean gull in there).

Female scaups

My personal highlight of the day was a lone sand martin that I spotted hawking over the water.


Sand martin

Pagham Harbour

As it was sunny this morning, we decided to pop down to Pagham Harbour, hoping we might find an early migrant or two. We first checked out Pagham Spit where we found a red-breasted merganser (drake) and a little grebe - two firsts for the year.

Red-breasted merganser

Not much else of note - apart from 100+ dark-bellied brent geese that were put up by a Royal Navy helicopter.

We then moved on to Church Norton, where the first two birds we spotted were a redshank and a curlew. When I looked up, I couldn't believe our luck: a female kestrel was hovering right above us, looking for prey. We had cracking views and watched this beautiful bird for about 20 minutes. Despite several attempts, she didn't catch anything while we were there. I managed to get a few nice shots that I will add to my gallery asap.

Female kestrel

We still hadn't seen any migrants (I had hoped there might be a wheatear around somewhere) when I heard a familiar alarm call: the first chiffchaff of the year! It was feeding in the shrub and was in very good condition. Lovely! Roll on spring!


Near the Severals, we heard a Cetti's warbler and then walked down to the beach, where we saw oystercatchers and had lovely views of a couple of turnstones.


On the way back to the car, we saw a pair of teal (beautiful!) and a curlew flew over. The kestrel was still hunting in the distance.
A lovely day!

Ashdown Forest

The weather was so lovely yesterday that we decided to spend the afternoon on Ashdown Forest, hoping to find a Dartford Warbler. One of my favourite birds! Always a special treat to see one - check out some of my DW photos here:

Dartford Warbler photos

While we couldn't spot any Dartfords anywhere (boo-hoo!), we did see a couple of croaking ravens, a buzzard, a kestrel, a pair of stonechats and several skylarks.


A male skylark was displaying and singing beautifully high up in the sky.

Another two skylarks were feeding on the path in front of us, giving us lovely views. One then flew up and perched on a gorse bush for a few seconds. Beautiful birds!