‘I don’t know what it is but I love it’ Birder, Ringer, Husband, Dad of 4, Kopite. In spare time I'm here Hilbre or on my other fave islands St Agnes, Islay...
What a superstar of a son I have! Drove me to
@Bempton_Cliffs
& pushed me up to JubileeCorner where we got scope views of
#BlackbrowedAlbatross
sat on sea. After a short while the majestic bird got up and flew behind the cliffs before heading straight past us at eye level! 🤩
The stunning
#PaleleggedLeafWarbler
@Bempton_Cliffs
this morning showed well at times but took considerable patience to get any photos 📸 love phylloscs 😍 thanks to the RSPB staff for great organisation re parking 🙏
I’m CANCER FREE 🤷♂️😭
I still have some way to go to recover from the op…but this news helps!!
So grateful to all the wonderful people
@CCCNHS
&
@TheChristieNHS
for all my treatment over the last 9 months. But also my rock, Mrs W, couldn’t have got through this without her ❤️
Absolute scenes when
@MJ_McKee
refound the
#Tengmalms
Owl near Tresta
#Shetland
this lunchtime and I played his voicemail on speaker live to the small group of birders at Bixter! A mythical bird for many British listers
#notorchesrequired
Incredible seawatch off HorsePoint
#StAgnes
! Apols for poor vid but everything drenched, hopefully you get the ‘feel’🤣 well worth it though with huge numbers
#GreatShearwater
several
#LeachsPetrels
Sooty, Manx, Balearic, Cory’s Shears, Bonxie & PomSkua (totals later). Just boss!
The
#BlackburnianWarbler
is one of the few birds named after a woman. Anna Blackburne (1726-1793) was an English naturalist. Her scientific skills were so well respected that people sent her specimens from around the world. Philipp Ludwig Statius Müller named it in her honour.
A great Friday afternoon twitch to Redcar with
@HERDOFHERDHALL
and the Stig. After a tense journey when the bird had flown the
#GreaterSandplover
showed superbly on the beach west of the car park
All happening on the ebb tide this afternoon
@hilbrebirdobs
- 3 Leach’sPetrels, 3 ManxShearwater, first winter MedGull and this cracking juvenile
#SabinesGull
passed the Obs veranda just after 3pm - love a Sabs me 😍
OTD 2021 I was under the knife…a 9hr operation. 5wks in hozzy. Yday I watched EuropeanCup s-final with my kids, went to Hilbre for the night, today I did some birding with a pal, some work (not much!) then went for lunch with the love of my life. LIVE LIFE NOW…you never know ❤️
There will be loads more and much better - but a great start to September
#birding
on
#Wirral
- the fabulously showy juvenile PallidHarrier at Parkgate Old Baths today iPhone-digiscoped
It’s been a slow few months, if I look tired I am! 12mth scans showed ‘something’, more scans... Today I got news we wanted, the ‘something’ has improved (probs healing from surgery). Back to 6-month scans, time to celebrate!Where better
@BuRntTruffle
of course🥂 thanks Jo & team
What a brilliant end to a great day on the Isles of Scilly. Showing my two eldest their first
#WoodchatShrike
on northern edge of Wingletang StAgnes found by Jeff (his last day on today & he only started birding this winter!). Only me and the kids watching it this evening.
An extended lie in
@hilbrebirdobs
this morning 😴 but when the rain eased I noticed a rather bright phyllosc in the SK. A quick walk round revealed this lovely
#WoodWarbler
❤️ one of my favourite warblers. Our 11th record ever. Swift over & a SedgeWarbler c&r since.
💥 Some day that! Started with a Wryneck whilst waiting for midday boat to RamseyIsland, where the
@RSPBRamsey
staff & Thousand Islands expeditions boat team guided us superbly to the 2nd for Britain
#BaybreastedWarbler
thank you guys 🙏 thanks
@EdgecombeM
for use of the scope!
I ignored the will of the people - but it was worth it!
#BlueRockThrush
on the Garrison, St Mary’s late afternoon - get in!! 20 year wait. BoC photo by Gary Bellingham
OTD 30 years ago:
#BluecheekedBeeeater
Cowden, East Yorkshire on 9July1989. Still one of the best birds I’ve ever seen in the UK - those 30 years have flown by!
#blockerlocker
Today’s
@hilbrebirdobs
#Hoopoe
and its shadow! Only the fourth record for the Obs and the first for an incredible 30 years (May1991) 😳 Well worth the wait though … and I’m so chuffed it waited for me 😎
Siberian-type Chiffchaff caught & ringed
@hilbrebirobs
Lovely ‘tobacco’ ear coverts, buff only super, nice buff-brownish upperparts, no yellow on underparts at all - nice black legs & bill … hint of green feathers on sides of mantle though 🤔
#SiberianChiffchaff
Enjoying a lie in when dad rang & said “what you doing?” I replied jokingly “lying in bed waiting for you to ring to tell me you’ve caught a Subalp in the SK!” ...it went quiet...”how did you know?” 🤷♂️ OTD: 2006
@hilbrebirdobs
only our 2nd record.
#WesternSubalpine
Miss you dad
Another fabulous evening with
@Scillypelagics
incredible views of
#WilsonsPetrel
with at least 10 seen plus lots of other stuff … haven’t downloaded my 2000+ images yet but here’s one of the first batch
Today we took one of our founder members Tony Bell (AAB) over to the island for the day to celebrate his 91st birthday. Here he is enjoying his picnic lunch ❤️
@hilbrebirdobs
(est. 1957) wouldn’t be here today without Tony and the other founder members - thanks Tony 🙏
Juv
#PallidSwift
? over
#StAgnes
found (and photos by)
@HERDOFHERDHALL
thoughts welcome on ID. Found over Castella and Coastguards and still present over Hump and Rosenhill at 1727hrs
My Phase3 treatment is now clear & I’ll be going under the knife soon. The op is bigger than we’d hoped & who the hell organised it for May?🤦🏻♂️ don’t they take prime birding time into account 🤷♂️🤣See you all on the other side (I’ll still be tweeting nonsense for a while though)😘
Some ropey shakey video! I was so excited
@Scillypelagics
last night I didn’t know which way to look or point the box brownie! Shearwater & dolphin frenzy topped off with some great views of whales…wait for it
#humpback
&
#finwhale
also watch out for Sooties amongst the Manxies
Back on
#StAgnes
this evening the male
#BlueheadedWagtail
(found by AndyH) was still in the cow field behind the Turk’s Head pub and my first HouseMartin of the year was feeding along the beach at PorthKillier with two Swallows
#IslesofScilly
What a smart bird!
#RusticBunting
found by
@dub_birder
on the other side of the track at Longstones, StMary’s where he found one last October which I also managed to see. Thanks Will 👍
#Raritymagnet
Here’s the Pied Wheatear photo from Meols see
@deeestuary
website - photographed by Richard Ashford
First record for Wirral (and Cheshire)
It is raining - was present yesterday evening and this afternoon ... see you all there in the morning 🤞
Absolutely chuffed to relocate the
#BairdsSandpiper
this afternoon a few hundred yards east of lifeboat station Hoylake/Meols after I was stuck
@hilbrebirdobs
over tide it flew just before I arrived! Superb find by
@SeanOHa19117792
- thanks for the shout👍 1st record for Wirral💥
Starting the week with one of my favourite birds - the
#PurpleSandpiper
- I took this photo a few years ago in good light reflecting off its feathers
@hilbrebirdobs
(obv) showing why they are called “Purple” Sandpiper. Not that often you actually see the ‘sheen’ so well on them.
Phase One of treatment (5 wks of chemo-radio) completed last Fri ✅ 💪 next phase was going to be leaving me to recover but consultant thinks I can cope so ...
Phase Two 3 months chemo 💊💧 starts next week. These guys are helping so much & yet they won’t thank me for the photo🤣
A fabulous day
@hilbrebirdobs
was topped off by my closest ever views of
#LittleStint
on the islands when this juvenile found by
@mattthomas966
fed in a favoured pool as the tide dropped (iPhone-scoped video - turn off volume to avoid wind noise!)
Enjoyed watching this
#Peregrine
take its prey and then fly off pursued by crows and gulls
@hilbrebirdobs
this morning (iPhone
#Swarovski
scoped using slow motion)
Yesterday morning
@hilbrebirdobs
my first walk out to the islands since end of April! Pintail, Greenshank, GoldenPlover, WillowWarblers, Whitethroat and 3 Snipe were the birding highlights but it was just great to be out!
#autumn
Another lovely morning
@hilbrebirdobs
with 3 figure counts of Chaffinch & Siskin over. The highlight was this juv
#HenHarrier
Despite wintering on the Dee they’re far from annual @ Hilbre this is our first record since 2016! Great to see such a magnificent bird on migration ♥️
These two amazing ladies have spent a lot of time over the last couple of days cleaning the mess from around the North End of Hilbre and the tide gauge using kids fishing nets - they’ve collected nine bag loads
@rebekah_mermaid
@twoplots
#localheroes
It’s great to be back on
#StAgnes
and where better to birdwatch from than the TurksHead pub. As I was sat relaxing after the long night drive … a slim-winged harrier briefly appeared over Gugh
#MontagusHarrier
a new bird on Scilly for me & a great start to our family holiday
A beautiful morning and a moon fly-past by a flock of
#PinkfootedGeese
@hilbrebirdobs
at dawn this morning. Part of a large exodus heading north out of the Dee estuary
#Wirral
this morning ... destination Iceland 🇮🇸volume up for added atmosphere!
Some iPhone-scoped
#swarovski
video of this morning’s male
#BeltedKingfisher
at Roach Bridge, Lancashire. My second in the UK after a male in Aberdeenshire in April 2005 … crikey was it that long ago 😭
This fabulous
#BlackGuillemot
showed superbly off the slipway at the North End
@hilbrebirdobs
this morning, thanks for the call by finder Ian H 🙏 as it soon drifted off south up the estuary on the west side of the island
At least I can relax … but
#Nutcracker
at Dunnet Bay, 🏴 brings back great memories of this bird in
#Staffs
in October 1991 … feeling old today anyway 🤣🤦🏻♂️ Good luck to all who go! 🤞 Very charismatic birds nutcrackers 😍
I was in
@TheChristieNHS
5wks for life saving surgery. Met so many professional, hard working & caring NHS staff from so many different parts of the world 🌎. Cleaners to surgeons they were all wonderful people making our NHS what it is. Thanks 💙 from my family
#notoxenophobia
How appropriate? 🤷♂️🤣
#StormIsha
brings an
#AmericanWigeon
of the form
#StormWigeon
to
@RSPB_BurtonMere
this morning - nice find by Ron Leadbetter. Presumably the Storm Wigeon from
North Wales 🏴 last autumn. ‘Smash and grab’ for me between work meetings late morning 👀🤣
The
#YellowbrowedWarbler
showed well occasionally in sycamores
@hilbrebirdobs
this afternoon - our earliest ever! Love em ❤️ proper autumn birding at last 🍂