Brown Shrike: A nice consultation tick after cancelling my trip to Tiree to see the yellow-billed flycatcher.
The reason being, the uncertainty once the news came through that n further access to the garden (where the bird was showing) was granted and another message from the residents requesting birders don't make the journey up. The lads I was going with all decided to cancel.
Obviously I was frustrated, all that planning and preying and money paid gone!
My frustration soon turn to anger as more and more birders made the trip across and more and more news came out that the bird was still there and you didn't need access to the garden to view it. I guess I'm not going to see every mega or see every first for the UK, I'm just thankful I get invited to these mega twitches.
So to cheer myself up I decided to go for the brown shrike in Norfolk, a bird that typically turns up on Scottish islands and can be hard to catch up with.
These migratory shrikes, like most are known to perhs upright on branches, shrubs and trees and this bird didn't disappoint in that respect.
The brown shrike breeds across central and eastern Asia, and spends the winter in India, SE Asia and Indonesia. And is a very rare vagrant to UK shores and this bird is in fact Norfolks second ever brown shrike.
A lovely consolation bird.
