A Blissful Hour

It was one of those busy Sundays which looked unlikely to cough up any birding time, but a window opened at around 5pm and I was through it like a shot. A few minutes earlier I had belatedly noticed a text from Alan: he'd found a Grey Phalarope nearby. Perfect timing. Venue sorted.

I have been spoiled for Grey Phalaropes this year, but I'm not going to pass up another. Especially at a quiet location where I might have such a bird to myself. Which is exactly what happened. At 17:25 I sat down on the grass, rested my back on a post and enjoyed point-blank views of this fearless little wader until dusk.

Weather-wise the afternoon would not have felt out of place in mid-summer, and the sunlight was initially far too harsh for my limited camera skills to handle. Still...

With the lens at a 35mm-equivalent focal length of 50mm, this is more or less how the naked eye sees it.

What a treat to see it climb out a couple of times.

Still some gingery edgings on the remaining black, juvenile scapulars.

Later in the day, and the sun beginning to set.

I spent more than an hour sitting there, completely absorbed, and it went in a flash. Between sessions with the camera I mostly didn't bother with bins, preferring unenhanced reality. The post title is not hyperbole. It truly was just that.

 

Out of the Blue

Recent visits to Cogden have been fairly uneventful, but that all changed yesterday afternoon. It was obvious that something was going on, with loads of gulls in the distance. They were on the sea and in the air, mostly around the area where the Cogden and West Bexington recording areas meet. And even from a mile away I could see they were almost all Med Gulls. What had attracted them? Soon enough I found out...

I'm not sure what this cultivation procedure is called (harrowing?) but the gulls like it.

There are 300+ gulls in this pic, almost all Med Gulls.

While this lot were following the tractor, there were loads more on the beach and sitting just offshore. Faced with a mass of birds I tend to undercount by some margin, so my estimate of 600+ Med Gulls is probably a bit short. However, I can safely say that my early morning Med Gull count yesterday was spot on: three. That is quite an increase through the day, and comfortably the biggest number of Med Gulls I have yet seen locally.

On the beach. Again, the vast majority are Med Gulls.

Searching through the beach birds for colour rings, I found two...

White 3758

Green RRSC, or maybe RR5C?

There was no way I could read these rings through binoculars; the camera was essential. There were doubtless a lot more colour-ringed birds in the throng, like these two unreadable examples...

Spot the two yellow rings. I am pretty sure that these will be UK birds.

With all these gorgeous gulls in the air, it was a fine opportunity to test my birds-in-flight photography skills. They are still pretty bad, and I got just one shot I was pleased with...

Adult Med Gull, with outer primaries still growing.

Yesterday afternoon's other highlight was an audience with the Cirl Bunting family...

Male. Note part-grown outer tail feathers.

Female, also in moult.

Juvenile. Full tail.

A bit later I got a flukey shot of all three together...

You can just about make out what they are: male and female on the right, juv on the left.

It is quite a while since the Cogden bushes have felt anything but empty, with my Chiffchaff and Blackcap counts rarely getting above two, so it was lovely to have a mass influx of a favourite gull completely out of the blue like that.

Lepidopteral Update

There hasn't been a Moth Diary entry for more than two weeks, so here is an update. Now, I realise this might bore the pants of some NQS readers, so at the end of the post is a little treat: a rare shot of a perched Clouded Yellow showing its upperwing.

I'll be frank. The heady days of summer, with their mothy abundance and myriad challenging micros, are over. Since the last Moth Diary (in this post on 19th September) the trap has been deployed on eight nights and bagged just five 'new for year' and one 'new for garden'. As recent NQS content has amply demonstrated, the birds are currently winning by a country mile. Nevertheless, there have been some nice mothy highlights...

 

Saturday night, 23rd September

16 moths of 7 species. Pathetic. Moths not even trying.

Monday night, 25th September

30 moths of 15 species. One lovely highlight...

A delicate immigrant Vestal, a male. Only our second this year.

Tuesday night, 26th September

35 moths of 13 species, though two were new for year...

Like flying lichen, this is Feathered Ranunculus. Recorded on 15 nights last year.

Black Rustic. Darth Vader moth. Recorded on seven nights in 2022.

Saturday night, 30th September

23 moths of 14 species. Nothing new, but two Black Rustics, plus singles of Diamond-back Moth and L-album Wainscot were nice.

Sunday night, 1st October

53 moths of 17 species; one new for year and garden. Much better. Having drooled over this very smart moth while picking through the Portland Bird Observatory trap contents a couple of weeks back, I was well chuffed to catch one here...

The garden's first Feathered Brindle, a nationally scarce coastal specialist.

Another nationally scarce coastal specialist; our second individual.

The night produced 20 Box-tree Moths, more than double our highest count until now. In 2022 we trapped 22 over 19 nights, with a peak of three. This year we are on about 120 so far. I think the picture is clear! Still, they are rather lovely, and we've had very few of these dark ones.

A local species. Our fifth of the year I think.

Monday night, 2nd October

40 moths of 18 species, but nothing dramatic. Oh, another Blair's Mocha though, bringing the 2023 tally to 'loads'. No photo of that of course. I wouldn't dare.

Tuesday night, 3rd October

23 moths of 10 species; one new for year. Until recording our first Beaded Chestnut on this very same night in 2022, I thought I must be overlooking it due to the similarity of some forms to the very common Lunar Underwing. We then ended up catching 24 over 16 nights, so this one may well be the first of a few...

Beaded Chestnut. This form is a doddle to ID, and probably the least similar to any Lunar Underwings we've ever trapped!

Another flimsy little Vestal. Gorgeous.

Wednesday night, 4th October

36 moths of 14 species; one new for year. Also notable was our third Feathered Brindle already, after none at all in 2022.

The very autumnal Barred Sallow. We trapped up to three on nine nights last year, and this is the first of 2023

Dark Chestnut. Last recorded in March, but we've only trapped a handful. Have wrestled with a few 'is it a Chestnut or Dark Chestnut?' individuals, but this is a nice fresh one, with very sharp, 90-degree apex. Even I didn't struggle with it.

Found this Rusty-dot Pearl, a regular immigrant, in the garden this afternoon. We've not had many this year, but the species' presence always gives me hope that a rarer immigrant might be just around the corner.

So that's the moths up to date. Well done if you've actually read all that. Now, as promised, a perched Clouded Yellow showing its upperwing...

...well, some of it.

One Bird

'It only takes one bird' is a tired old cliché you'll often hear trotted out to encourage birding slackers into the field in unpromising conditions. Well, tired it may be, but also very true. So many times an outing is made memorable by that 'one bird'...

An early visit to Cogden on Friday was lifted from obscurity by a vocal, fly-over Golden Plover, my first of the autumn. One bird.

For a change I managed a mid-afternoon visit too, and was so convinced there would be no fireworks that I set myself the task of counting Stonechats. The final tally was 54. It was 17:20, with 50+ Stonechats in the bag, and I was on the coast path by the previous day's Wryneck spot. I glanced briefly at the calm sea, and at that moment a wader flew west along the shoreline. Only a Grey Phalarope! It flew well past me, veered away from the beach and plonked on the sea for a short while, but carried on west before I could get close enough for a photo. I had been scanning fields and hedges all afternoon and barely looked at the sea. Perfect timing. One bird.

Saturday morning's outing had to be short, so I tried West Bay, heading up to the West Cliff quarry which hosted last year's Barred Warbler. The list would have been supremely feeble (2 Chiffs) had it not been for a Barn Owl wafting into the quarry at 07:15. A very unexpected West Bay tick, it perched for a few seconds and peered at me, before tucking itself under the overhanging curtain of scrub. Pete saw it shortly afterwards, out and hunting. One bird.

Yesterday I was at Cogden from 17:00 until dusk. A Blackcap, 5 Chiffs, a few Yellowhammers. Nothing much, really. Oh, apart from the superb Merlin which dashed NW past me and on over the coast road, my first of the year. One bird.

Cogden again first thing this morning. Boy, it was gloomy. Thick cloud, a bit mizzly, and just a single Wheatear on the beach. I definitely was not feeling it. A few feet offshore was a straggly, broken string of weedy raftlets riding a gentle swell. Normally I would not dream of hoping to find a Grey Phalarope in such conditions but, after Friday's bird in what was almost a flat calm, naturally I had an optimistic scan. Optimistic, yes, but I was nevertheless gob-smacked to realise that the distant, Grey Phalarope-shaped bit of something-or-other poking out of the weed actually was a Grey Phalarope! Though unfortunately it was not hanging about. As I hurried along the beach towards it, the bird kept moving east in fits and starts, and I never got anywhere near it. One bird.

On the return leg along the inner coast path I was pondering this 'one bird' thing that so often applies to my short outings, and how I might turn it into a blog post, when a speeding bullet whizzed past me across the reedbed. It was a Merlin, in hot pursuit of breakfast. Breakfast didn't wait around get eaten though, and the Merlin landed on the beach.

Thwarted Merlin

So, this morning - just for a change - two birds.

Still Some Jam in the Pot

Since Monday's visit to Cogden I've managed three more. They have gone...er...rather well.

Tuesday

Only four species made it into note form: 3 Whinchats, 8 Wheatears, 2 Chiffs and a Reed Bunting. But two of the Whinchats more than made up for the slim list. As a rule, Whinchats don't allow you to get close enough for a decent pic...

Whinchat. That'll do.

This one is a fresh juv.

Ni-i-i-ce

I'm guessing that amount of white in the wing makes it a juv male. But that is a guess.

So that was nice. Nothing scarce, but a lovely encounter with what is normally a shy species.

Wednesday

The day of Storm Agnes, which barrelled up the Irish Sea but missed us here in West Dorset. It was breezy, especially in the afternoon, but seawatching action on this side of Lyme Bay was unspectacular. It was hard to believe that Berry Head, at the south-western extremity of the bay, witnessed an astonising movement of 7,000+ Great Shearwaters in one hour! I managed 6 Balearics and an Arctic Skua from West Bay. At lunch time I went for a walk at Cogden.

I hit the beach at the eastern end, where a busted-up bunker makes for a handy shelter from the wind. I sat in its lee and peered at the lifeless waves. Actually, not lifeless. There may not have been much passing, but a tiny, familiar shape was attending a straggly raft of weed just offshore. Amazingly I had sat down opposite a Grey Phalarope! It was pretty mobile, and seemingly moving east. When I eventually lost it I assumed that was the direction it went. Cogden Beach, from its border with West Bexington to the first slopes that become Burton Cliffs, is roughly one mile of the Chesil continuum, and I was now at the eastern end. I spent the rest of my walk scanning every inch of sea visible from that mile, and found two more Grey Phalaropes. The second was almost half way, but rather distant. In the rough sea I just could not get on it with the camera, and soon lost it. The third was off those incipient cliffs, just before the caravan park. The slight elevation probably helped, because it too was initially a fair way out. But it helpfully flew closer. Some pics...

Grey Phalarope #1. I was surprised at how well some of the flight shots came out.

This view shows the bird to be an adult.

And here is Grey Phal #1 on the water

Grey Phalarope #3 in classic pose.

This shot is full frame at 2000mm zoom, and gives some idea of the challenge. For me, this image really captures the feel of seeing these incredible birds in such conditions.

Buff wash on neck, black on scapulars etc...this one is a juv/1st-winter

Grey Phal #3. Quite chunky little things in flight

I cannot prove that bird #2 wasn't one of these two above, but I am happy enough that it wasn't. Yep, I'm having all three. Incidentally, Mike had a close look at our respective photos of Monday's bird and twigged that we had photographed different individuals! So it's quite likely that Cogden waters have hosted five Grey Phalaropes this week. A bare minimum of three, anyway.

A few more shots from Wednesday...

'Just' a Rock Pipit, I know, but I cannot recall seeing Rock Pipit on Cogden Beach before. There were two. Probably a bit early for migrants, so I'm guessing they were wanderers from Burton Cliffs.

Very moody sky as I departed Cogden yesterday. Looking inland...

...and looking west. Possibly mammatus clouds?

Today

This afternoon's visit started well...

Cirl Bunting

I'll be honest. I do not have sufficient expertise to tell whether this is a juvenile bird or an adult female. Help is at hand though. Watch this space... (Edit: it's a juv.) 

It also ended well. Very well!

I had just completed a repeat of yesterday. The slightly less-rough sea had been thoroughly grilled, but on this occasion for absolutely zero phalaropes. Ah well. Turning away from the beach I relaxed. Time for home. Unfortunately I relaxed a bit too much. Normally I scan the path ahead - you never know what might be hopping about in full view - but this time failed to do so. Three birds flushed at my approach. Two were Stonechats, but the third was not. I had glimpsed it from the corner of my eye as it dived into a hedge, and thought it seemed a bit large for a Dunnock. It hadn't gone too deep though, and I could still see it. Just about. However, the jigsaw of bits visible made an improbable picture. Surely that's not a Wryneck?

It was a Wryneck.

A photo was out of the question really, so I backed right off and messaged Mike. Within 25 minutes Mike arrived, and a couple of minutes later...

Cogden Wryneck.

Thank you, Mr Wryneck.

I then had to rush off, already a bit late for certain grandparental duties, but met Alan arriving. I was chuffed to hear later that the Wryneck was cooperative. Hopefully it will still be there tomorrow...

The title of this post is an obvious reference to the final paragraph of the last. I hope that pot holds more than I think.

I like Cogden Beach, with its Grey Phalaropes, Wrynecks and incongruous flotsam.