In Fife again

I've been in Fife again, a combination of family, work and birding. Naturally birding comes first. Sorry, I mean family comes first, followed by work, with birding a distant third. Despite this I have managed to get out and about in the county and seen a few things, though nowhere near what I thought I might - basically a lack of time to go sea-watching at Fife Ness has rather caught me out, and instead I have stayed pretty local.

My first birding this time was actually in the garden here, and in under two hours I added five new birds. This included a Garden Warbler, a decent bird in Fife, as well a flyover Grey Heron and Cormorant, neither of which I'd seen here before. I think this is just an indication that I have in reality spent little time birding from the garden, and thus any prolonged spell is likely to add at least something. The Garden Warbler was excellent, in a patch of undeveloped land that I can see from the over the wall. I'd seen at least four Whitethroats in there, and when this popped up briefly I was wary of the potential pitfall, but I held the area in the bins and managed to see it again to eliminate any doubt. A Tree Pipit buzzed over too, something that I'd earmarked as high potential, so for it to actually happen was a punch the air moment.

Predictably I spent most time at Letham Pools - four visits in five days. It continues to be a wonderful site, and whilst the turnover of birds was not high, I saw all sorts of species I'd not encountered there before, including such gems as Grey Partridge, Jay, and Meadow Pipit! I am still at that happy stage where there are so many possibilities - my final visit this morning was only my 22nd; by way of comparison I have 1,147 lists from Wanstead. I will miss it when I go back home.

In addition to visiting Letham I also went to Lindores, a nearby loch that is stunningly pretty. There is a house on the far side that I think I would die to live in. In fact I keep seeing houses I would like to move to. I mean Chateau L is of course lovely, but a house looking down the Firth of Forth with two mature monkey puzzle trees in the garden and Skuas flying overhead in autumn? I think I could cope with that.

Lindores Loch

As ever eBird was my constant companion. It keeps track of my various site lists, shows me what others have seen and where, and generally spurs me on to really focus hard on Blue Tits and Dunnocks. This is no bad thing. At Lindores I doubled my site list just by going birding properly, by exploring the margins rather than just pointing my scope at the water. And by going birding in August whilst the summer visitors are still here. It is these small things that keep me happy, at least up here, and I am not yet at the stage where I need a biggie in order to achieve satisfaction. Long may that continue.

The most remarkable thing of all is that one of my kids came birding with me. Three times no less! Once to the beach at St Andrews on a family walk, once along the Braes Loan trail close to the house, and, most amazingly of all, to Letham at six in the morning! My children have not really been birding with me properly for years, it was wonderful. We had the scope and I was able to line up various things for her and then describe what she were seeing as she looked. We found nesting Swallows and House Martins and were able to have extended views as they came and went - I don't think she'll ever get those wrong now. Yellowhammer, Reed Bunting, Ruff, Black-tailed Godwit, Rook and others were also all studied closely, and some of them may sink in too. It is a slow process, as I know only too well, but you have to start somewhere.

Dalgety Bay

Madeira May 2022 - Day 4 & Trip List

Last day! Mick decided to have another go at seabirds and so went out on another Dolphin excursion. I wasn't up for it and instead went to Machico to try for photographs of the Grey Wagtail subspecies, Schmitzi. In summary we both did terribly. Mick saw almost no seabirds, and I botched the single two second opportunity I got by getting a pile of reeds in the way. At this point we gave up birding.

There are hundreds of these. I don't understand why people don't eat them.

Our flight back was early evening, and after a spot of lunch the afternoon was spent having a wander around the Funchal Botanic Garden, where my attention turned to Agaves, Cycads,  Palms, Cacti and Aloes. Wonderful - what a climate, oh that I could do something similar here. Well, partly I can I suppose, and plant cuttings that I brought back from Madeira several years ago are now established in my garden - the Agapanthus flower in profusion every year. 

Aloe plicatilis (now Kumara) in the background, with Agave attenuata in the foreground

No trip to Madeira is going to see you come back with a large list of birds. Even if you do the pelagics you'll only add a few. It is a case of quality over quantity. You can see the trip list with locations and checklists on eBird, or if that is a bit too dorky, here is a quick reference table.

Madeira May 2022 - Day 3

We started the day back out at the Ponta Sao Lourenco, the rocky peninsula that you frequently fly over on the final approach. When we had first visited it was crawling with people hiking out the end, but early morning it was more or less deserted. We holed-out with what we had thought was a nailed on Spectacled Warbler photo shoot, with the bird no longer present, but instead found an area on the far side of the peninsula which seemed very birdy. This was where we found the Rock Sparrows as well the ubiqutious Berthelot's Pipit , and a a group of Atlantic Canaries with young. A brief Peregrine Falcon was probably quite a good bird for Madeira. That said it could have been a Barbary Falcon I suppose, given the location. Here's the photo in case any of you want to make a call either way.

Rock Sparrow

We spent a fair amount of time here, occasionally glancing up at the mountains to judge the weather, before deciding that the clouds were probably thin enough that we would be OK. So, onwards to Santo Antonio da Serra via the Ribeira de Machico. Here we walked around the local park, finding quite a few Madeira Firecrest and our first Greenfinches of the trip. Looking at the map we also found a reservoir that I had no idea was even here. Although it only had a few Grey Herons this time, it could be a good stop at the right time of year. It is best viewed from the east side, along a road that leads to a couple of houses.

In the evening we watched the nightly spectacle of the Shearwaters moving slowly along the coast from the Ponta da Cruz, although without a scope we were somewhat limited in what we could pick out. Although some of the Cory's were quite close, the vast majority of birds were further out, and so Barolo Shearwater went begging I expect. When I next visit I am definitely doing two things. One - going on a proper birding pelagic, and two, bringing a scope in order to seawatch!

Growing up

Last week my son got his A Level results. This week, my middle daughter got her GCSEs, and my youngest a single GCSE, French, that like a chip off the old block she took early. If you need concrete proof that you are a has been this is one of those life moments that serves as a stark reminder. When I started this blog the kids were five, three and one. The one year old now has a GCSE! How old must it mean I am?! Er, nevermind... Anyway, if you go all the way back you will find photos of them as babies and toddlers. Now they have phones and bank accounts. And now, qualifications. Time is moving swiftly, swifter each year it seems. Blogs of yesteryear, or whatever preceded them, would at this point be saying about how they would soon leave the nest. Fledge. Move out. Not in 2022, nor for the forseeable future. The crisis is almost existential, and young people have never had it harder.

So they are with us for a while yet, and the exam results seem to have heralded an urgent need to move on. After this summer holiday our front hall is piled with bags and boxes of things the children no longer want, but that all those years ago were their world. Nowadays that sense of nostalgia seems to have transferred to the old folks - i.e. me. As you get older you become more sentimental, and so I find myself going through it all retrieving items laden with meaning that cannot possibly be thrown out or given away. Some are mine as it happens, my childhood books that my parents kept for me and that I then passed on to my own children. The entire Swallows and Amazons series for example - I found these in the hallway piles too - so callous!

Most of course is theirs. Cuddly toys, clothes, their own books, and drawings that for me at least have huge significance. I think they will regret these rash decisions, and so I am quietly (and not so quietly) keeping back a few things. Times move on of course, and we are not really hoarders, so I suspect that in one or two journeys to charity shops the vast majority of this will be swept away and forgotten about, and that that will be that. In the years ahead they may come to wish they had kept a few things, and maybe at that point I will be able to surprise them with a long lost toy or keepsake that they thought was gone forever.

Some things, books especially, can be refound. When the kids were small and I realised that my beloved Richard Scary books were gone, I found them all second hand and was able to relive my childhood through their eyes. Some things I did manage to keep hold of though, and a tweet on my timeline reminded me to go and look for it. My first bird book, or the first I can remember at any rate.

The inscription plate on the inside cover tells me that it was from my Uncle John and Aunt Colette, and is dated 1985. I was ten years old, and it was Christmas. I expect that I was in Sussex when I unwrapped it, in the small village of Litlington where my paternal Grandparents lived. The Collin's Guide may have now taken its place, but I adored this book, and it is one of the things I am glad I kept. On my bed today is my first teddy, from an aged relative called Auntie Mary who lived in Bexhill, as many old people do. There are a lot more of course, to my family's disgust, and I do worry that if I pop my clogs suddenly this callous streak they seem to have may come out and consign them to an unseemly end. I hope not. I may leave some instructions, a condition of their inheritance....

Passing things on is the best thing to do. You know and hope that the new owner will show the same love, care and appreciation that you did for all those years, but your responsibility ceases and you can stop worrying. Of course as soon as you are out of sight they may toss whatever it is in the bin, but as long as you don't know that you are in the clear, and with a warm glow. We recently passed on an orange and yellow dog that we bought in Paris for one of the kids. I found it unceremoniously dumped in one of the plastic bags, and wiping away the tears saved it, too lovely to discard. After a wash it travelled to Reading as a gift to a new baby who straight away started chewing its ear, just as ours used to do. This is the way.

So a new stage of our lives feels like it is starting. There are many positives, but I also think it might be quite tough in some ways. No doubt we will get through it, and it is not as if the last two years have been exactly smooth sailing but we have largely got through them. Not totally unscathed, but we are out the other side and there are many things to look forward to. Winter 2022/23 is not likely to be one of them however.

Rain!

The Thames Water hosepipe ban started yesterday. Like a good citizen I went out into the garden and tidied away the hoses and the sprinkler I've been using on the vegetables and pots lest they lead into temptation. The water butts are full, the watering cans are out, and I am ready.

It was inevitable therefore that last night the heavens opened. Lightning flashed and thunder rolled, and as I typed this early this morning it continues to bucket down (29mm recorded by 1pm) What passes for my lawn already looks greener. This is but a temporary respite, we need much, much more to replenish stocks of water in the south-east. Not that anyone really needs a hosepipe for their garden much beyond September, but I expect that the ban will last for much longer. I've read a few interesting stats about water recently. They are all from the internet, so caveat emptor and so on, but:

- Since the water industry was privatised by Mrs Thatcher over 30 years ago not a single new reservoir has been built in England. Some, like Abberton, have been enlarged, but nothing new has been constructed.

- The water companies have paid around £60bn in dividends to shareholders since then.

- At the current rate of investment and repair each water pipe needs to last for 2000 years. The lifespan of the newest PVC pipes is 100 years. Somebody else's problem I guess.

- I could run a hose for 73 years and use less water than Thames Water loses in a single day to leaks. 

No doubt this is not the full story, but it seems a bit rich (which incidentally is what water companies and their CEOs are) to impose restrictions when these companies have singularly failed to plan for the future and instead just pocketed huge sums of money. Mind you did anyone expect any different? Of course not. What can I do about it? Nothing. The modicum of good news is that whilst reading up about hosepipe bans I discovered that dripper hoses on a timer are exempt. I use a couple of these to efficiently water a bed of ferns and a bed of semi-tropical plants - palms, bamboos and agapanthus - so that is one less thing to worry about. But I have huge numbers of plants in pots, two greenhouses, and a vegetable patch that I am now going to have to water by hand whilst continuing to pay Thames Water a pile of cash. Excellent.

Today's saturation should mean I get a few days off, but various plants in the greenhouses will still need doing and somehow I am going to have to find more time to get round them all. In normal weather it is fine. When it is in the high 20s my greenhouse gets to well over 40 degrees and whilst my plants in pots love this it means they dry out very quickly indeed. Many are drought-tolerant, but it is easier on them if they have water. On the plus side the heavy rain has highlighted a few leaks in the conservatory, so there is less watering to do in there.... 

Twitch on!

A couple of weeks ago I went on another twitch. This is the third this year, and they have all had one thing in common. Well, two things in common. One, they have all been successful and not dips. And two, they have all been ridiculously straightforward and essentially stress-free. This one was the easiest yet, although as the bird in question was a Gull it was of course totally rubbish. Yes indeed, the Grafham Water Kelp/Cape Gull, a first for the UK. I'm pretty sure I haven't seen many firsts - Eastern Crowned Warbler in South Shields sticks in the memory, but that might be the only one. Oh, hang on a minute - Acadian Flycatcher at Dungeness is probably another. Regardless, it does not happen often, and generally I dislike the air of desperation/madness/grown men losing their shit that accompanies such things and so avoid them. This however was just too easy to pass up.

Yuck

I would not have known about it all had Tony not put out a message on our patch chat group. Whilst I do have BirdGuides I don't know why I do as I hardly ever look at it. All the mega noises it has been making recently have been to do with the Shrike and the Albatross and so I came to ignore it. However the Wanstead messages make a different "bong" and I was on to that straight away - it might have been a Redstart!. But it wasn't.

"Cape Gull anyone?"

You what?! I've seen this species in South Africa, and the nominate Kelp Gull in Argentina, but never in Cambridgeshire..... Anyhow, as we all know this was not a wind-up, and a decision was made within about two minutes. Sunday morning, no plans, Grafham Water under an hour a half away, no traffic issues and a hulking great scabby Gull that was unlikely to move. We could be back mid-afternoon and continue our lazy day as if nothing had happened. And that is exactly what panned out. There is no point stringing it out or trying to build suspense. We drove there, saw it immediately, and came home again. I think I was drinking a Daquiri in the garden before 4pm.

Fulfilling? Well, ish. I mean it is clearly a very rare bird (here) and I do not see very rare birds very often. It was just pleasing to have it all go our way with no drama whatsoever, to snaffle it so quickly and be home almost before we were missed. The bird showed extremely well, and because we were quick off the mark there were no issues with wacky races or with parking, nor a particularly enormous crowd (it was nice to see a few familiar faces from Shetland, including a birder from the SW who got there only marginally after we did!). We were in and out within an hour, within the first parking fee band in fact which was great as I loathe paying for parking. The other day I got picked up at Edinburgh airport and the fee for the short stay was £9!! Highway bloody robbery I tell you. Anyway, so simple, and when the Gull decided to fly further up the reservoir to a reeking trout corpse we decided not to follow it and instead go home for celebratory drinks.

First for the UK = Two drinks. Like I need an excuse.

Four Redstarts

Unusually there were no Redstarts found on the patch this spring. All to play for then. Last week the first arrived on Wanstead Flats. I went to look for it and dipped, and it is alleged that other birders ticked a Chiffchaff! Today solved the issue for everyone, with four birds, possibly five, spread across the Flats. Rob found the first in the SSSI - handy as I was birding in the Brickpits about two minutes away. By the time I arrived he had found another, with both birds shimmering in the same bush, tails a-quivering. Nice. 

Meanwhile L & G had found another along Centre Path, a smart male. Could this be a three Redstart day? No, or at least, not yet. Although the bird had momentarily vanished, another had been seen up at the Enclosure. This too had disappeared by the time I got there, but had been replaced by a Pied Flycatcher, presumably the same bird that has been giving me the runaround the last few days, and I finally got some decent and prolonged views. I fancied there was some more activity beyond this bird though, back out towards the brooms, and skirting round the side and out again the first thing I set eyes on was the male Redstart. They are just superb in this plumage, even if they are not quite as glossy as they would have been earlier in the year.

The others gradually assembled, and when the male flew out of the Hawthorn a female/juv type followed it. Surely different to the birds across the road, I'd been on the patch less than an hour and seen four Redstarts! Late on Nick came across another male near Alex, which is likely a fifth bird. Wanstead Flats is simply sensational at this time of year, and I can't wait to get out again tomorrow and see what else is there!