Latvia - Trip List

Slightly on the meagre side but numbers don't tell the whole story. I got to see a new country, one that harbours promise and I look forward to a spring visit to top it up. The habitat looks great, a weekend in May could be epic.

Latvia - Trip Report

I landed at about 1pm and started birding straight away, I was very excited to Latvia in daylight. I think the first bird was a Hooded Crow on the veritable trek from the terminal building to the car rental car park where I found my vehicle. As I drove out I added a Jay, a Buzzard, a few House Sparrow and a Herring Gull. I'd not been on the road long before I was forced to stop for an Egret that turned out to be a Great White, at this stage I did not realise that this would be pretty regular, ditto the White-tailed Eagle that flew over the car.

My first real stop was at Lake Kanieris where I walked out to an observation tower that overlooked the marsh. There were tons of people around, people jumping out of cars and rushing down the track, I couldn't figure it out. None of them looked especially like birders or nature lovers, my assumption was that there was some kind of treasure hunt or the like going on, bearing in mind this was only just outside Riga.

Lake Kanieris

I made it through the throngs to the tower and climbed to the top from where the view was fantastic. Setting up my scope, for I was in full birding mode, I started scanning the far reaches. There were surprisingly few birds in evidence, but what there was was pretty good. For instance the only Terns were Caspian Terns, and you can't really argue with that. White-tailed Eagles crossed the landscape, treating me to many more ducks than had initially been visible. I was surprised to see a group of Red-crested Pochard arrive from the north and settle with some regular Pochard, Coot and Goosander. A few Goldeneye were about, but by far the most numerous birds were Mute Swans - I nearly got to 100. Small birds were almost entirely absent, I got a Robin and a Chaffinch in the woods, but these were trumped by Bearded Tits in the reeds immediately below the tower. Perhaps this was because of the increasing wind? I hadn't been especially aware of it at the airport or whilst driving, but at the top of a tower attempting to use a scope it began to get a little tricky. Hmm, was this to be a bit of a problem?

Most of Latvia looks like this

In short the answer was yes, and as I progressed up the coast via various stops to Kolka the conditions deteriorated. At Berzciems a quick tootle out to the shoreline revealed hundreds of Mallard and Wigeon, smaller numbers of Teal, and then a handful of Pintail in with them. At Kolka itself it was raging, and the wondrously tall tower there was essentially unusable as it actually sticks out above the treeline. Birding conditions were far better at ground level, especially on the shoreline where the pine belt provided a level of protection. But of course the sea was being whipped up considerably, and keeping on the birds was very hard. There appeared to be hundreds of Common Scoter relatively close inshore, and then hundreds of Gulls hunkered down on the beach itself, doing pretty much the same as me. In the trees I found three species of Tit, Goldcrest, and a Raven flew over. As dusk fell I crossed my fingers that the weather would pass through overnight and I would have clear day the following morning. My accomodation was about 30 minutes away and as I drove there it just got worse and worse. Oh dear.

The beach at Cape Kolka

The less said about my accomodation the better, I should have paid more money to stay up at Kolka. But I survived it, managed to cook a meal even, and was out at first light. The weather was better than I expected, still very windy but far less wet. Wind I can cope with, but I loathe getting wet when birding, it just takes all the fun out of it. I drove back up to Kolka and started birding around the end of the village. Clouds of Fieldfare swirled aound in the choppy skies and a Black Redstart was on the roof of a barn. Crossbill flew between stands of pine, but some of them didn't sound quite right - Merlin picked up both Common Crossbill and Parrot Crossbill but I couldn't find any of them in the trees, the tops of which were taking a right battering. 

I walked up the beach towards the Cape seeing very little, but turning the corner and thus gaining some shelter from the pine belt birding was immediately better and I set up my scope and pointed it at the sea. There were Scoter at all ranges and as far as the eye could see. Had I continued down the beach I probably would have counted thousands but just in my limited view there were around 420 Common Scoter and 150 Velvet Scoter. A much tighter flock of Greater Scaup numbered well over 200. Long-tailed Ducks flew west to east and around the corner, as did several Red-throated Diver and a single Black-throated Diver, and amongst the Scoter a few Great Crested Grebes were to be found. The beach itself had a lot of Gulls on it, and a few Sandwich Tern resting up.

Heading back towards the village by the road I was stopped in my tracks by an unfamiliar call that I felt I knew. Willow Tit! When is the last time I saw a Willow Tit in the UK? Well the magic of eBird says that it was in 2010 at Fairburn Ings, and that all subsequent records have been in Northern Europe, most recently in Germany this summer and before that in Holland whilst twitching the Spectacled Eider (it's back btw). Looking up at these lovelies some caudatus Long-tailed Tits came into view, a group of around eight then crossing the road in front of me, and some more Crossbills flew over that again sounded a bit odd. Goldcrests were everywhere.

Tundra Bean Geese at Kolka

Birding around the chuches and nearby houses I found at least half a dozen Black Redstart, and was suprised to also find three Tundra Bean Geese near the campsite. Near where I had left the car I realised that some odd songs I had heard earlier but could not find the bird were in fact coming from a tape. This I established when the ringer emerged from the bushes and went over to his car to eat a pickle. I went over for a chat but his english was limited so instead we conversed in latin. It had apparently been a slow morning ringing-wise, a Chaffinch, but I did learn that both species of Crossbill were indeed present, and that an Amur Stonechat, a first for Latvia, had been present a few days ago but had now gone - we went to look for it together with no success. Whilst walking to where it had been he rang his son, Edgars, also a birder and a practioner of both latin and english, and passed me the phone. Thus I was able to get load of very useful gen on the area and what to try in the difficult conditions. For instance I learned that there were some Slavonian Grebes on the sea, and also that a Surf Scoter was present and that sometimes waders could be found on such and such section of beach. 

Back at the beach I had a more focussed scan of the sea and managed to pull out a Slavonian Grebe close-in in the swell, as well as a Bar-tailed Godwit, but the conditions were too difficult for the Scoter, and in any event it might have been a mile west of me as the Scoters extended at least that far. I also met a couple of Spanish birders who were enjoying the weather as much as I was. 

One of the churches at Kolka

I felt I was now done with Kolka and needed some new habitat to explore, so started making my way back south stopping along the way. I added Siskin and a few other bits, but the best impromptu stop was at Krievragciems where I managed to find a spot that had a small view of the lake which otherwise I couldn't find any way to get near. Within this tiny opening I added a pair of Whooper Swan, and behind me in the gardens were Marsh Tit, Goldfinch, Tree Sparrow, and best of all a Great Grey Shrike. Whilst failing to find a way to the water's edge I stopped for a Rough-legged Buzzard, and added Woodpigeon and Yellowhammer to my fledgling Latvia list.

As I continued south the weater got nicer to the extent that the sun came out, and with the wind having dropped it all became rather pleasant. Another stop at the sea added another Slav Grebe and loads more Scoter of both species. Given I was now about 100km from Kolka was this just a random flock or in fact are there Scoter wintering along the entire coastline?

I finished the day at the Kemeri Bog Trail to the west of Riga. I wished had arrived earlier as I not anticipated having to walk for a good 20 minutes through the forest to even arrive at the bog. Said forest did contain Great Spotted Woodpecker, more Willow Tit and also Crested Tit though. When I got to the start of the bog part a long wooden boardwalk stretched out ahead and I realised two things. One, I would run out of useable light long before I reached the end. Two, it would be much better in spring. So I'll come back another day.

The start of the Bog Trail

Anyway, with dusk approaching that was the end of birding and I made my way back to the airport and home. It had been harder work that I had thought and the trip count was only 71 - I had expected to do better, at least numerically, and my camera had barely seen the light of day. But it had still been a nice introduction to the country which seems very unspoiled. Outside of the city you feel as if you have gone back in time. Lots of very old wooden houses exude an air of self-sufficiency and permanence, and on the outskirts of villages crumbling soviet era apartment blocks stand a sombre monuments to the country's past, their year of construction often emblazoned on their now disintegrating walls. Whilst I didn't find many places to eat or get a much-needed coffee, Citro supermarkets of varying sizes were everywhere and it was easy to get by. As I said, a spring visit feels as if it would be very productive.

Latvia Weekend

Latvia, October 4th-5th 2025

I have been to Latvia before but only at night. Birds, zero, and I had been meaning to sort this out for a while. A trip planned for May fell through so when I found a cheap flight in October I decided to go for it even though I felt spring would have been rather better. Indeed it likely would have been as my visit coincided with some awkward weather which made birding very hard. But I made the best of it and still came away with a reasonable list of birds seen. Once you leave Riga you are very quickly into wonderful rural habitat, low intervention agriculture, if any, and a lot of lovely forest and wild coastline. With only a day and a half, and with migration in mind, I concentrated my efforts on Cape Kolka at the very tip of the westernmost part of the country. What could I see?

Logistics

• A weekend trip in early October.

• Flights: from Heathrow to Riga on British Airways on Saturday morning. This gets you in just after lunch so there was sufficient time to bird my way up the coast to Cape Kolka. On Sunday the flight home left at 9pm so I had the whole day.

• Car Hire: A semi decent car from Avis did not cost a great deal on top of the flight. I think all in it was about £200 for the flight + car.

• Driving: Simple and straightforward, although some roads are a bit knackered and once you get off the beaten track they are largely unpaved.

• Weather: A right pain in the backside! A southerly gale complete with copious rain made birding virtually impossible in all but the most sheltered spots for a large part of Saturday afternoon and Sunday morning, whilst also killing migration as birds presumably waited in Estonia instead of crossing the Gulf of Riga.

• Accommodation: An absurdly rustic and bizarre place in Dundaga, about half an hour south of Kolka . I would have stayed at the Cape but by the time I had decided where I would be going there was nowhere left that was reasonably priced. It was awkwardly cash only (I didn't have any) and for various reasons is hard to recommend! Rather than a kitchen it had a simple camp stove and electrics that would make any qualified person in the UK shudder. It made me, wholly unqualified, very nervous, but I had to deal with it as I could not find anywhere to eat out. Luckily the village had a good supermarket otherwise I would have been really stuck.

• Food: There seem to be small supermarkets everywhere, but restaurants in the countryside are few and far between.

• Optics: Scope and tripod for looking out to sea at Cape Kolka. I did take my camera but I barely used it due to the conditions.
• Literature: eBird of course.

Itinerary

Saturday: A tolerably early flight from London arrived early afternoon after which I birded north towards Kolka. Stops made at Lake Kanieris and Mesrags before getting to Kolka at about 6pm. Overnight at Dundaga which is about 30 minutes from Kolka.
Sunday: Early start to get back to Kolka at first light, but the seawatch and birding in general was rather trying in the blustery conditions. I came away by early afternoon and birded my way back to Riga along the coast.

Song Thrushes

I have no idea if I have ever been aware of this before - probably - but each autumn there seems to be a period when Song Thrushes dramatically increase in number before they seem to melt away again. In late winter I become aware of their presence again as they start to sing at dusk and in the early mornings, but for large parts of the year there just aren't any. Or at least not that I see.

From Scilly over 16 years ago!

One morning this week I counted 21 from the Vizmig point, including two flocks of six. Flocks! Normally I see single birds, so I had first assumed they had to be Redwing, but when one or two of the group called I worked it out. I still couldn't quite believe I had seen over 20 before I headed off for work though - amazing. Later on Bob reported that his overnight nocmig recording had 64 Song Thrush calls on it which is extraordinary. 

This has been the pattern for most of the week, albeit not the numbers of Tuesday. I missed all the Ring Ouzels, a minumum of six on the Flats on Monday, but on Wednesday I finally added Fieldfare for the year after a lacklustre approach earlier in the year. They're now around in small numbers, or at least moving through, and there are many more Redwings arriving.

I like this time of year. It's not about rarities, it's just about enjoying the spectacle of migration. I counted over 170 Jackdaw today, and Finches are moving in larger numbers now, mostly Chaffinch or that annoyingly silent Finch sp., but also smaller numbers of Redpoll, Goldfinch, Greenfinch and Linnet. I've missed a few Brambling too, and a Short-eared Owl, but my early start this morning was repaid by a tootling Woodlark over the Flats. Lovely, and all right on my doorstep.

And just like that....

And just like that I stopped writing. I always find it strange how it happens, as if there is magic switch that has been flipped. One I don't have access to. I'm fine, pootling along, working a lot, seeing very few birds. Two exciting things happened since I last stopped by here. 

One, I went to Latvia. You may or may not remember a post from last year about Latvia and how I'd seen no birds there and wanted to put that right. In that post I mentioned I was going to Latvia in April. I didn't, it got cancelled. The airline mucked about with flight times so much that I think it ended up being a four hour trip. So instead I went last weekend. The weather was a bit pants, other than one brief period of sunshire just after I arrived on Saturday afternoon it then turned excessively windy and quite wet which is not ideal for birding. But I still managed to see a fair bit in my quick visit, and have got a bit of a feel for it. A write up will follow in due course, I don't have the capacity just now.

Two, I took a day off work to go and taste wine. I would normally never take time off to go drinking, but this was too good to miss. My name was drawn out of hat to attend The Wine Society's autumn press tasting. As the name suggests this is where their new list for the second half of the year is presented to wine journalists, critics, writers, bloggers, influencers and.....me. I attended not in any of these capacities but as a lucky member of TWS (as it is known). I got to chat to wine buyers and members of the organisation, something that in retrospect I wish I'd done more of, and generally just immerse myself in a side of the wine and spirits business that I would never normally see. And, if I so chose, to taste through 120 different wines. I saw this a challenge.

Spot the famous wine journo...

I taste wine all the time, as in I drink it all the time. I go to wine-themed dinners, I go to small tasting events based around a grape variety or a country, or even a vintage. I have been known to travel to wine regions and visit producers. But this was the first professional tasting I'd been to and I had no idea what to expect. One thing I did know was that I wanted to taste as many as possible, all of them if I could. To see if I could manage it, to see if this is something I enjoyed, to try and see things from a different point of view to how I normally interact with wine.

It does not take a genius to work out that even a tiny sip of 120 wines will get you absolutely sozzled. I spat everything out and walked out stone cold sober - that's what the professionals will do and that's what I did too - an iron will is needed. An iron palate is also needed, it is amazing what swilling so much wine around your mouth does to your taste buds. It destroys them is what it does, or in my case it made me extraordinarily sensitive to sweetness, such that by the end even dry red wines felt ridiculously sweet. But I did manage to taste everything, and I also managed to write notes on every single one that actually made sense the next day when I started typing them up. I won't subject you to them, it ended up being a 5000 word piece, the length of a mini dissertation. 

Overall a very educational day indeed, I have no ideas how the pros do it, it was exhausting. A marathon - four hours means two minutes per wine. Think about that the next time you read something from Jancis in the FT!

Ticking over

Blogging has faded, I have little to say so I say nothing. We have been here before, this is just the way it goes. There is just about enough for a couple of paragraphs, or I hope so anyway, let's see how it goes. What can I muster?

First up is a day trip I did to Germany a while back. I flew to Hannover after work and holed up in a hotel near the Haupt Bahnhof. Early the following morning I got a train to a town to the west of the city called Wunstorf, and from there caught a one-a-day bus further east to the village of Winzlar. From there I walked to the Steinhuder Meer, a large lake that from my research had appeared very birdy. Indeed it was, and by the time I had to catch the one-a-day-in-the-other-direction bus back I had seen over 80 species including Black Woodpecker, Little Stint, Wood Sandpiper, Spotted Redshank and Common Crane. It was excellent, even though in the half light I had taken the wrong track which had subsequently run out at just the stage where retracing my footsteps would have been really annoying. I ploughed on, through ditch and over fence, eventually regaining the right route but not before getting totally soaked in sodden vegetation. Take my socks off and wring them out soaked. It was like Northumberland all over again and made the rest of the morning quite trying, with shoes that weighed the same as bricks and a distinct squelch every time I took a step.

Despite this initial setback I had a lovely morning in full-on birding mode. The catalyst for the trip was an irritatingly poor German eBird list that I felt that I needed to rectify. I have fallen out of the habit of these European day trips and had forgotten how fun - and exhausting - they are. In the afternoon I had a late lunch and wandered around the old town for a bit before flying home. All very pleasant and relaxing, though 34,000 steps took their toll.

Closer to home I've seen a Pied Flycatcher and Med Gull on Wanstead Flats, and in Fife I ticked Glossy Ibis for Scotland. In the course of trying to find a Garganey that same evening I got ticked. I did not find it until the following morning in the shower, and half asleep and wondering what the funny little blob on my stomach was managed to break it off leaving the head embedded - it only came out today, just over a week later. Nice. It is now red and inflamed but that'll just be a local infection rather than anything nastier. Still annoying though, and wasn't on my radar for Fife at all. Now I know. Other than that it was a good weekend with plenty of migrants including Pied Flycatcher, Spotted Flycatcher, Redstart, Spotted Redshank, the Garganey, and another good seawatch at Pettycur that was notable for passerines rather than monster seabirds - a big movement of Swallows, Meadow Pipit, Siskin and Redpoll. These four species were everywhere I went, and Redpoll was a tick for Letham Pools, and was Kingfisher - 103. Won't be long before they're back in Wanstead I thought, and sure enough Bob had some Siskin earlier this week, and this morning I did some vizmig out on the Flats and saw 195 Swallow and 177 Meadow Pipit. Quite a decent count for round here, but I still feel that me and autumn proper have yet to get acquainted. A couple more weeks remain to put that right.

Twenty years Part II

Well well. Am I on a roll or what? For reasons I don't fully understand (although I suspect laziness) I've been spending more time skywatching from the balcony recently. Of course what I should have been doing is getting my arse in gear super early and getting out onto Wanstead Flats at first light but I am finding I can't quite get myself over the line. Instead I've been waking up at around 6am, having a bit of a potter, making a coffee, and then sauntering over to the battlements for a squiz at the sky. All nice and relaxed.

This takes me right back to what I found to be one of the most enjoyable features of lockdown, and which somehow I've dropped along the way. Skywatching. Back then I added 15 new species in two years to my at-that-time 18 year old garden list, but until earlier this year I hadn't added a single new species since May 2021. That changed with the singing Nightingale in April of this year, and last month I reached my 100th species with Great White Egret, as recounted here. Mission accomplished, and part of me thought that was that. Not so!

With news from the less feckless out giving it their all on Wanstead Flats that there was a Nuthatch in Long Wood, a highly unusual occurence, I wondered out loud whether there could be a movement happening and might I finally get one on my garden list? About 15 minutes later that is exactly what happened. As usual the Parakeets were drowning most other things out, but from over towards the southern end of Bush Wood I thought I heard a faint call. Immediately I was on maximum alert, every last percent of my hearing focussed on that one horizon, hands cupped behind my ears. Had I imagined it? I had not! It called again several times, the double chuitt one. GET IN! 

Twenty years. Nearly twenty-one. Nuthatch had been high on my list of possibilities, but I had assumed it would be a foraging bird moving through the gardens in winter. Given James' news from the Flats perhaps this is post-breeding dispersal? Equally the birds are resident there and in many ways I am surprised never to have heard one in all of my many skywatching sessions. Either way it is now on the list. I wonder what will be next?

Nuthatch - probably took this over ten years ago

An ideal day

Of course part of me regrets not going to Norfolk to see the Black-winged Kite. Only a very very small part though. I would have made it, it chilled out in the same dead tree for most of the day, but I couldn't bring myself to bother. The time wasn't right. One day it will be and there will be no stopping me, but yesterday was not that day. 

I went birding in the morning. Slow going, the same birds lingering. A steady stream of Swallows on both Saturday and Sunday perhaps the highlight, we can go months without seeing a single hirundine. The same two Redstarts were in the same Hawthorn, it was perhaps just the Whinchat that had changed over at some point. 

Back home I rushed around doing a million things. Busy busy. The biggest thing on my to-do list involved getting up a ladder and cleaning the inside of the conservatory roof which had been bugging me for a while. Lots of mould, lots of stains, lots of spiders. I only nearly fell off once - it would have been a disaster as an incredibly spiky plant would have broken my fall. As it was it merely pierced my arm in multiple places. What's that red stuff on the window? Oh, my blood. Nice. I cleaned that up too. There are a few places that I've not been able to reach but I'll get there in round two, and it looks ever so much better already and for now I'm pretty happy with my efforts. After that I mowed what is left of the grass, had a shower, and clean and fresh mosied over to the fridge to see what was going on.

Fresh anchovies was what was going on. I gutted them - there is not a great deal within an anchovie - and gave them a light coating of olive oil, nothing more.  Also in the fridge were several bottles of wine, including a Tempier rosé that I'd put in earlier thinking that it might be the last chance this year. In a stroke of genius however I'd also put a bottle of Tempier white in there, and it was this I reached for now. 

I grilled the anchovies over charcoal and we ate outside. Wanstead in the first week of September could have been the South of France in May. Occasionally, just very occasionally, I get things very very right indeed and this was one of those moments. The Tempier white was an inspired choice, the combination was terrific. It had just the right amount of body to go with the white meat and just the right amount of acidity to cut through the oily skin, with a delicious sreak of lemon and something herbal going on. Along with some dolmades and olives, and then a cheese board featuring Rove des Garrigues, we had the most simple and wonderful lunch I can remember for a long time. We were transported. This set me up perfectly for an afternoon nap, after which I relit the barbeque and we did it all over again with some chicken I had marinated during my earlier whirlwind of domesticity. No additions to my British list, but I'll likely remember today for a lot longer.

Officially autumn

I think of September as autumn and not summer. Birds do too, although for them the return journey often starts in July. It has been a great summer, there are lots of detractors but I for one love the warmth. The vast majority of my plants revel in hot weather, and it is also ideal for drinking Rosé. Less ideal for what passes for grass here at Chateau L, and I expect that life is pretty tough for many of the birds I so enjoy. One species of something loses out, another steps in. I had my best ever growing season in terms of my plants putting out new leaves, I saw far fewer breeding Whitethroat. These two things probably have some measure of correlation. Nothing is ever perfect but this is the beauty of having lots of different hobbies. One fades, another gains in prominence.

As summer has waned plants have taken more of a back seat and birding has come back to the fore. I've been out quite a lot and a number of the expected migrants have fallen. I actually found Tree Pipit on the same day I published my last post on local birding, but I'd written it a couple of days earlier when in full unstoppable flow and set it up to go live a bit later. A week or so after that I woke up in the night, full of Syrah, to hear a very vocal Tawny Owl somewhere in the neighbourhood. I've been saving that one. And then more recently than that, this weekend I managed to connect with the Pied Flycatcher found earlier in the week by Nick who is unconstrained by commuting and offices. All going according to plan in other words, though I think I might have been in Germany when Tony found a Sedge Warbler. Getting a little late for those though I did have one last week in Fife so maybe there is still time. The good news is that the weather is now more unsettled, and that means that birds may get dropped in. I am here for a while now and hope to cash in, though not at the expense of getting soaked.

Onwards and upwards. 104. Average is what I am all about.

A Wanstead Pied Flycatcher from yesteryear (2015)

More Fife Seawatching

This is NOT what you want at Fife Ness!

I remained in Fife for the Bank Holiday Monday, part of a three day plan to cash in on a seabird bonanza. The opening salvo, as described here, had gone really rather well, and whilst I spent the Sunday birding locally in mid Fife and just pottering around the house, on Monday I was chomping at the bit again. The weather had other ideas. I had popped into Fife Ness in the morning to find it totally dead - clear and sunny weather, barely a breath of wind. Half an hour was all I gave it before concluding that there was nothing to be gained by hanging around. I had a pootle around Kilminning, a Wheatear and late-ish Swift my reward, before deciding that Largo Bay was in fact the place to be. 

I was not wrong, it was superb. As ever I placed myself on Ruddon's Point which allows you to scope both the expanse of Largo Bay as well as the beach. It was low tide and carpeted in Waders and Gulls - nothing special but I picked out a few Bar-tailed Godwit and enjoyed the Sanderling. The water was almost but not quite like glass, with Auks everywhere and large rafts of Eider. It was shirt sleeves weather and supremely pleasant even if there were no stand out birds, it's still a little early for the Divers and Grebes. Away from the water the best bird was a Treecreeper and a site tick, hanging out in the belt of pines on the way to the point. I went home for lunch a happy man.

As good as the Bridled Tern and Cory's Shearwater were, they were both found by other birders. Of course I do not mind riding on the coat tails of others one little bit, but I don't deny that when it comes to seawatching it is intensely satisfying to work it out for yourself. So in the afternoon I went down to Pettycur Harbour, a very good spot for seawatching in the Fife. It is approximately opposite Leith (indeed you can scope the Royal Yacht Britannia) and juts out towards the island of Inchkeith exactly where the Forth narrows. You're low to the water down at the harbour, but the views out are to where birds feed are excellent, and often you find birds come around the corner between Inchkeith and the viewing spot before heading back out, affording good and close views if you are lucky. The previous days had seen Cory's Shearwater, lots of Skuas, and a Sabine's Gull.

I set up the scope in the lower car park and started scanning, initially hard work in the bright sunshine, but the weather decided to do me a favour and as the afternoon passed the light got better and better. The first Skua I saw was a Bonxie headed east and out, passing in front of the island and disappearing around the point. I never saw it again, but interest soon returned in the form of two pale phase Arctic Skua that came around the corner ridiculously close in and then gave a great show chasing (together) and unfortunate Common Tern that happened to be be in the wrong place at the wrong time. Common Terns are remarkably agile, but so are Skuas, it's just extraordinary to watch. A short while after this a nice gingery juvenile Pom pitched up in exactly the same space. It didn't chase anything at this point, just cruised leisurely around. I don't have a vast amount of experience with this species, but I get better each time, and when it flew directly away I got a real sense of the bulkiness of the body that the Arctic Skuas hadn't shown at all. 

By this time the channel had become much busier with a massive flock of Gannets, Gulls and Terns swirling around to the west of Inchkeith. Feeding was constant, and of course in came the Skuas. They were impossible to keep track of - at one stage I got to eight Arctics, including three pale phase birds that I presumed two of were the same as I'd seen earlier. There could have been more than this though, as birds kept wheeling off and either coming closer to me - including the two pale phase birds that stuck together and at one stage pitched down on the water - or heading further out into the Forth where I lost them. The Pom I spotted only once in the fray but it was extremely busy and it could have been there the whole time. This activity probably continued for well over an hour, but then came a conundrum. In the melee a smaller Skua stood out, not only for it's size versus a Tern versus an Arctic Skua versus a Tern (too many versus?), but because of its flight action and habit of almost hovering on high held fast-beating wings before dipping onto the water briefly. Dainty. In short it felt more like a Tern but was clearly a Skua - a pale belly contrasting with greyish uppers and a very pale head. I only saw it chase other birds perhaps twice, and there were none of the sustained and dogged acrobatics of the Arctic Skuas. Was this a Long-tailed Skua? Everything about it felt different, how I wished that there had been someone competent there to verify it. I made notes as best I could in order to try and work it out later.

And later on I did indeed get some help. The following day another birder reported a juvenile Long-tailed Skua from the same spot and so I got in touch to hear about his experience of this bird and described my own. It sounded good. Later that day I then did some internet research - videos of LTS are very limited as it happens - as well as 'phoned a friend'. Piecing together all of these things has left me feeling quite confident, though whether I have enough to get this accepted I have no idea. I'll try though. All of which means that in my mind at least this was a four Skua seawatch. I've done this before down at Pendeen many years ago, but I expect back then I was put onto most of the birds and so by myself at Pettycur last Monday just felt better and more satisfying. No Sab's or Great Shearwaters, they'll have to wait for another time, but my weekend looking at the sea had been nothing short of amazing.

Played for and got

Another day, another attempt at seawatching from Fife Ness. I had not realised it at the time of planning all my autumn trips but it happened to be the Fife Bird Club's annual 'Big Day' at Fife Ness. Perfect. But what would the weather do? What indeed.

It turned out to be rather benign. As usual I might add. You just can't plan for these things, and even if I could I expect something would happen to prevent me seeing any sea birds. An impenentrable haar the most likely. Whatever. I didn't care, I was going to go anyway, even though it meant getting up at silly o'clock. The ancestral seat is in mid-Fife, and Fife Ness whilst not actually that far away, seems to take forever to get to so I don't go anywhere near as frequently as I would like.

I arrived at Fife Ness just after six in the morning. My luck was in and not only could I park down by the shore, there was also one seat left in the hide. Even luckier than that, the creme de la creme of Fife (and Stirling!) sea-watchers were in the hide. I took my place amongst this stellar crowd and started to get my eye in. Manx Shearwaters were passing frequently, almost all north, with the odd Sooty Shearwater. For a relatively frequently-encountered seabird it still blows my mind where these come from.

The first indication of quality came just pretty quickly, with Jared picking up a Balearic Shearwater slowly tracking north. Despite my best efforts to distract him he was still able to give directions and I managed to get on it at the first turbine. Pretty distant all things considered, and I hope to see a closer one at some point. Skuas were fairly numerous, keeping us all interested - you can't beat a good Skua.

We peaked just before 8am. A bird came in really from the south, really quite close. So close that it passed the hide before we really knew what was happening. Initially called as a Long-tailed Skua on colouration, that changed quite rapidly as the realisation of what was passsing began to take shape. Not for me of course, I was very much a passenger still. Jared corrected himself, still not really quite confident in the words he was blurting out.

Bridled Tern. 

Cue pandemonium. Screams of "is anyone still on it???!!". I was, it was heading north rapidly, I tried to give directions but probably just flapped uselessly. We exploded out of the hide as one, running north, shouting to the other assembled seawatchers as we did. Not sure if anyone outside the hide had been on the initial pick-up, but they ran too, around the pillbox to scan the bay to the north. And there it was, flying around in big circles, dipping occasionally to feed. Back to the hide to fetch scopes, it was still utter chaos with Ken trying to shout directions, put out Whatsapp messages ("BRIRDLEVN TERN FN HANGINFG ABOUT" will go down in history), and phone every birder in Fife simultaneously. Gradually common sense returned and a few of us returned to the hide to get the scopes and start watching the bird properly. Colin came out, features started to get discussed, all the while directions stil being given. Amazingly the bird continued to fly around just offshore, not as close as the initial sighting, but the scope views were excellent. As it drifted a little further out it caught a small fish and appeared to then drop onto the sea. I might have been the only one still on it at this stage as most people were distracted by phones, messages, the first tentative photos and identification features, but I was amazed to find that it had landed on a buoy. 

It was very distant, but soon most people's scopes were back on it and a nice line of optics awaited the first arrivals. Malc fetched a few from Crail who had been en route even before this monumental event had occured, and gradually the numbers swelled. I don't know how many eventually saw it but had you been in Fife and moved even moderately quickly you would have been able to get it. It changed buoys after a while but remained in the area for another three hours before heading away and north-east. A first for mainland Fife following a 2013 record on the Isle of May - the two seemed to be treated quite separately.

To say people were elated would be a huge understatement. Huge. Ken was beside himself, a 25 year wait for this moment. A master-communicator (see above!) his sole aim was getting the news out, "check the underwing" frequently instructed! The only confusion species is Sooty Tern - that's black and this was a greyish-brown. I've seen one before of course, recounted here back when this blog was moderately good, but this was in Fife and counts for so much more. Mostly it's notable for being my first ever decent seawatch here during years of trying to time my visits to coincide with something decent. In the days before I had arrived there had been twitchable Cory's Shearwater and Sabine's Gull in the Forth, and Great Shearwater past Fife Ness. This is completely normal and always happens a few days before I arrive. But this time I actually scored, and whilst it was a big Shearwater that I had really wanted, I'll take a mega Indo-pacific Tern.

People trickled back to the hide, the vigil resumed. It would be hard to top what had just happened, but this was a big day and we needed to stick at it. Manx and Sooty continued to pass, but there were long periods of nothing. Greenshank on the rocks, and a small group of Barwit passsed south. Dum-de-dum..... Puffins.......Gannets.......Common and Sandwich Terns. Should I leave? Oh, another Pomarine Skua north, one of three. Maybe I'll stay, after all it's nearly 4pm, not long to go....

"CORY'S!"

"Close in, coming north!"

A large browny-beige Shearwater hove into view at close range, gliding effortlessly on bowed wings past the hide in lovely light. A magnificent moment. As good as the Tern had been, this was what it was really all about. Played for and got. This was the one I had wanted, the one I had planned for I don't know how many times and always got my timing wrong. Other than birds seen from a boat off Madeira - see below - this was easily the best views of a Cory's Shearwater I'd ever had. Sublime, utterly magical. I have been on cloud nine ever since. 

Cory's off Madeira

What is average anyway?

Regular readers (Hi Alan, hi Seth!) will know that I love a list and a stat. A couple of the last entries here have contained a nice round stat, with a Fife patch and my garden both getting their 100th bird. A long time coming. This post also concerns 100, albeit in a more regular way, and the keen-eyed (unsure if this is Seth or Alan) will notice that this is also my 100th post this year. 

Yes, somehow I have engineered things such that my patch-year list has gone over 100 at the precise moment that I tap out my 100th post, and shortly after Letham Pools and the gardens at Chateau L have also reached 100. Timing is everything.

About half of the time I would reach 100 before August, one year I even managed it in April. As you would expect I keep stats on this kind of thing. Love a list, love a stat. So one of my recreational spreadsheets shows that since I started tracking this stuff my patch average by the end of July is only 99. Only once at that end of August does that average rise to 103, and in fact such is the joy of numbers that if I reach 103 in the next week or so then the average will increase to 104. If I reach my average I remain below average? A bit unfair.

Anyhow, the 100th bird this year was a Spotted Flycatcher in one of the burnt bits on Wanstead Flats. It was followed almost immediately by a Common Redstart in the same place. Whilst it's sad that the patch looks like the interior of a BBQ it does seem to draw in the birds, all of which seem to shine out in constrast to their charcoal background.

There are more birds to come. It is Tree Pipit season for starters, and I would expect Pied Flycatcher too. I need to get my skates on if I'm to see a Common Tern though, it may already be too late - they tend to visit the Park sporadically on feeding trips and the need for those may be diminishing or finished. Other targets include Sedge Warbler which I missed in the spring, and I suppose that one mustn't completely discount Wryneck or Short-eared Owl, both of which have appeared towards the end of August in years gone by. And then of course there is all the winter stuff which I missed earlier in the year due to motivational struggles. Fieldfare...

Here's one I prepared earlier

Game changer

It was my birthday a few months ago and my extended family bought me a Coravin. For the uninitiated this is a device where you can extract a small amount of wine from a bottle without pulling the cork and without impacting the continued aging of the bottle. A thin but very robust needle is inserted through the cork, and inert argon gas is inserted whilst wine is extracted. This means that oxygen never comes in contact with the wine, and thus in theory it continues to age as if it had never been touched. This means that you can taste individual wines by the glass rather than committing to opening an entire bottle. In a house where I'm for the most part the only red drinker this could be supremely useful. Possibly this is why the family bought it for me, so that I drink a glass rather than a bottle. I'm touched.

It took me several months to pluck up the courage to use it. Nearly six in fact. The sacrificial bottle was a 2013 Cavallotto. The cartridges of argon gas are not cheap - think ink cartridges for printers in terms of the equation here - so you need to think reasonably carefully about what you use it on and not waste it on something cheap. It's also not entirely foolproof, there are a reasonable number of stories about wine aging prematurely despite the argon, so it's probably not one to use on that special bottle of Richebourg either. Cavallotto's Bricco Bochis is neither of these things and as I have a couple it seemed like a good candidate. Of course it was totally delicious, this is a producer with whom you cannot really go wrong - incredibly fragrant and tasty. The real test will be the second glass that I extract, will the wine be as if I'd just pulled the cork, or will it show some signs of having been opened? Once you've taken a glass and extracted the needle the cork should then reseal itself. Anyway, it's back in the cellar and so far there does not seem to be any seepage, so let's see how it goes. Could be a game changer.

Twenty years

I've lived in Chateau L for over 20 years. A mere blip in the history of such an esteemed residence of course, and who knows what came before, but in this, my 21st year, an important milestone - perhaps the only possible milestone - has finally been reached. 100 birds.

The full garden list is here, and of course normal rules apply. That is to say that this is birds seen or heard from my garden, rather than birds in my garden. Otherwise the list would be about fifteen. It's an important distinction - if I can see it or hear it from within these four walls turrets then on it goes. So mostly it is flyovers, and some birds have flown past just once in those twenty years, or at least just once when I've been here to see it happen. Then again is Osprey a daily occurence? Likely not.

Gratifyingly the 100th bird was one of my top predictions, a Great White Egret. A southern European species that has been steadfastly moving north, it was only a matter of time in my view. It took 14 years to see one at all, but since 2018 I've now seen nine here. Most of them have been seen whilst I've been out birding on Wanstead Flats, elation as still a rare bird by any standard, but often tinged with disappointment knowing that had I been at home the bird would have easily been visible from the battlements.

Finally, this weekend just gone, the inevitable happened. I was at home, or rather back home, having already returned from a pretty mediocre visit to Wanstead Flats. Minding my own business in the kitchen I noted my phone beeping. It was the local birding WhatsApp group, the ever-alert Tony informing us that a GWE was flying west from Alexandra Lake towards Coronation Copse. West is key, it means the bird is coming towards Chateau L. East and it is already too late. 

I grabbed my bins, still on the side from my recent outing, and charged up the stairs like a man half my age. Gazelle-like, possessed, three at a time. How long had it taken him to type the message, should I look out the back or the front? Would it carry on west, would it veer north? Crucial decisions that I've got wrong before, Oystercatcher remains to this day 'heard only'. I threw open the french doors to the balcony. No, it felt wrong. Back to the front, to the tried and tested method that has in the past netted Osprey and Raven, standing on the toilet with my upper body fully out of the velux and thus able to scan 180 degrees unimpeded.

Boom! Perhaps 30 seconds later it actually flew down the street, or at least over the gardens of the houses opposite. Lazy but deliberate, floppy yet controlled. I drank it in as it disappeared north-west towards Walthamstow. It felt like forever but was probably through and gone in a just a few seconds. No time for the camera but that is always a secondary consideration. That  one view is all you need for a garden tick that will remain for time immemorial. Here's what it looked like (though the bill was black on this one), one of my photos from somewhere else entirely. Clearly it would have been wonderful to have had it with local rooftops in the frame, but I'm not fussy, it was still a 'moment'.

Annual

Well it is that time of year again. Grass fire time. Wanstead Flats is being repeatedly set on fire by either idiots or full-on arsonists. In July the bit to the east of Alex went up again, it had just about recovered from the last fire. We lost about ten acres on Monday in the SSSI, and at some point in the the last few days an area near Angel Pond has disappeared as well as a new part of the SSSI.

Motorcycle Wood

It's annual now. Each year by late July the patch is tinder dry, fires just waiting to happen. This was a major fire. I was coming home on the bus on Monday and could see fire engines and blue lights everywhere, towers of smoke and flame. As you can see above Motorcycle wood has been saved by the monumental efforts of around 70 firefighters, but it has been burned on all four sides. 

Walking around the area a few days later, I came across this:

Is it any wonder? When will these things be banned - they're for sale in shops about two minutes walk from Wanstead Flats, prominently displayed outside on the pavement as you walk towards Forest Gate. This falls into the idiot category of course, but I do wonder if these fires are more sinister. They seem to be so close together, only a day or so apart. The cynic in me thinks about someone looking on in delight as all this goes on, and when that high has diminished creeps out and starts another one. Who knows? As far as I know none of these fires have ever been traced to anyone, including the massive one a few years back that nearly caused my street to be evaculated in case it crossed the road. Those flames were several metres tall, I remember the whole area being in a cloud of smoke, it was like something out of Apocalypse Now.

Angel

This is our future. Annual fires destroying the habitat, more pressure on breeding sites and feeding areas. And it seems only a matter of time before one of these coincides with a hot and very windy day and it becomes more than a grass fire. Let us cross our fingers that never happens. Anyway, that's the news from the patch as autumn begins.

Letham and around

 

Letham north pool

So whilst the sea-watching didn't go especially well I managed to spend a bit of time pottering around my usual sites in mid-Fife. I wasn't able to add anything that other people would consider especially tasty at Letham, it's the right time of year but the water levels remain too high for most waders to pay it much attention. But I did walk down the water treatment compound access lane on the south side on the off-chance that there might be some birds on the sunny sheltered side. This is a dead end leading to the gates and I don't go down here frequently as it's a little awkward to get out again in the car, but I reckon I should as it was a hive of activity with loads of Blue Tit, Great Tit, Willow Warbler, Chiffchaff and Wren, and better still Song Thrush and Treecreeper, both of which were site ticks. I literally could not believe it when I raised my bins and saw the Thrush, it has been a target for ages but I assumed I would hear it from afar and perhaps get a scope view. It positively shone on the branch before flitting deeper and away. The Treecreeper (and it turned out there were two) I heard before I saw it, then the desperation of needing to see it kicked in. I could hear it constantly, and then all of a sudden it was in front of me. Wow! Pure magic - the power of a patch. Further down there was another. This meant that I was now tantalisingly close to the magic 100 mark. 

Before this week I had expected that any new birds would have had to have come from the sky - a passing Osprey or something like that, which would need time and luck - but that lane now seemed to hold the key. All it would take is a Blackcap I mused....

Letham south side, from the lane

The next morning I arrived at Letham just after 7am. This time I pulled straight into the lane. As I got out of the car I various small birds scattered. Was I imagining it but could I hear Blackcap tacking? I could! A family group of three in one of the hedges by the road! 100 species for Letham! Otherwise the lane held broadly the same species as the previous day, albeit no Treecreepers or Song Thrushes. I first went to Letham in 2020 and this was my 51st visit. There is a price though - I worked out that I've driven a minimum of 900 miles as part of those visits which is a little sobering. Then again I've driven 6,000 miles to and from Rainham over the years. The way I see it is that I've driven virtually zero miles whilst birding Wanstead, and if Wanstead Flats were the same distance from my house as Letham is from the ancestral pad I'd have driven 25,000 miles. It makes you think though, how many miles do UK birders collectively drive whilst birding 'locally'?

Elder bush marked on the left, the lane to the gates on the right.

Back on the road between the two pools I pointed my scope back at the water treatment plant and zoomed up. Amazingly one of the first birds I settled on was the/a Song Thrush sat on the edge of the main tank! Right, now here's a challenge! You can guess what I mean by that. It took a while but eventually I picked up a female Blackcap in an elder bush - about 300m distant! It is a moot point as the lane is clearly part of Letham as I see it, but it was still very satisfying to be able to see it from where I normally stand. My standard patch inclusion rules are "on or from", i.e. if I could definitively see a Red Grouse on the East Lomond from where I was stood it would be on my Letham list! Whilst on this detailed scan of the south side I also picked up four Grey Wagtail on the rotating arm, four Magpie on the buildings, three Robin, a Blackbird, multiple Chiffchaff and several bright yellow Willow Warbler. It didn't end there though, the 101st bird arrived very shortly as a Crossbill circled the site and then continued south. I'd heard Crossbill in late July down on the coast at Dalgety Bay, and also that very same morning at Angle Park. They are on the move and on reflection I suppose it wasn't a huge surprise to get one here too, even if wasn't on my immediate radar.

So, Angle Park then. This is rapidly becoming another regular site as it is under two miles from Letham as the Crossbill flies and so is easy to combine into one outing. This is where I found a GWE last year, the vanguard of what amounted to an invasion in Fife over the following weeks. It's next to a landfill and is carpeted with Gulls a lot of the time, but that aside it's pretty decent with a lot more exposed mud than Letham at the moment. This delivered a Ruff which was new for the site and I also added House Martin and Canada Goose. Green and Common Sandpipers were here too. I've given up on The Wilderness, the landowner has made it increasingly difficult and you can barely see the water any more. 

As good as Letham and Angle Park are, they're a few miles from the house and when I'm up here this is where I spend most time. So more than a few hours were spent simply skywatching from the garden. Swallows and House Martins were constant, and the odd group of Swift came through as well. On Saturday afternoon my patience and alertness were rewarded by a distant raptor. I was on the terrace having just finished a family lunch, and as binoculars weren't really appropriate in that setting I had to charge into the house to get them. It turned out be a juvenile Marsh Harrier, fortunately moving slowly enough that a 20 second delay didn't prove fatal, and was a great garden tick. A decent bird in Fife as well, but most of my satisfied glow on this visit came from Letham.