13/01/2024 Lunt Meadows, Sefton ecks

Green-winged Teal: Between the family duties around the festive break and now being back at work its took me a while to get myself over to Lunt. 

This yank teal has made itself at home here for a few months now and I'm glad its stuck around so  I could go and see it. The bird was associating with the Eurasian teal on the great-white egret pool at the far end of the site. 

It eventually showed really well after drifting in from the submerged vegetaion and took a power nap on the nearside bank close to the sluice. 

Richardson's Cackling Goose: Another bird that has taken up residence at Lunt, albeit for a much short time so far is this diminutive cousin of the Canada goose, the cackling goose. With stubbier bills, steeper foreheads and a shorter neck they side by side they really do stand out.

Cackling geese that frequently in the wild in the UK, usually associate themselves with either barnacle or pink-footed geese. However there has also been a number of records of birds appearing on their own or with feral geese and these are often assumed to be escaped birds - this may be the case but it is entirely plausible that at least some are wild birds too.

Smew: A good morning spent on the reserve topped off by a drake smew, this bird initially gave me the run around and I saw it fly off from the main lake land on one of the border pools. 

09/01/2024 Heybridge Maldon, Essex

Northern Waterthrush: Local birder Eddie Aldridge first saw the bird when he captured it on a wildlife camera in his back garden and showed it to a man walking nearby, then the chaos broke loose. 

The next day more than a hundred birders braved the damp and dreary weather hoping to get a glimpse, descending on the small village in search of a rare American warbler. They relocated the bird foraging within a ditch close to the house it was first seen. 

 This rare American passerine was one bird I wouldn't have dreamed of seeing this January, the first big big of 2024. So keen to go down I shook off what was my lingering cold and headed down. 

This bird is well at home on this small ditch where it has been roosting at the base of the concrete culvert for over a week. The bird has been fairly reliable, returning to its roost site and leaving each morning before foraging along the damp banks of the ditch and the floating vegetation around the mouth of the culvert. 

This bird is not actually a thrush species but a warbler, one that has a close relationship with its waterside habitats or which comprise of boggy thickets, especially willows and alders, and wooded swamps. At other times, it also frequents mangroves. In migration and winter, it uses a variety of wooded habitats, near water.

The bird gets it name from its thrush like appearance, it is beilved that they resemble spot-breasted thrushes (e.g., wood thrush and hermit thrush) from which they take their name. 

No bigger then a water pipit the Northern waterthrush doesn't look or act much like other warblers, which typically are flitty, fast-moving birds. Perhaps as an adaptation to their ground-feeding habits, they are brown and white and streak-breasted and they walk about slowly on the ground, constantly bobbing their tails. 

The fist recored Northern waterthrush was back in 1985 on St Agnes, Scilly's and the last one in the UK was recored in 2011 again on Scilly so it's been sometime since the last one. 

The bird was relatively close and confiding, despite the large crowds of onlookers, the biggest issue was the weather, cold, freezing an dull, with grey clouds is was difficult to get a high resolution image. I'm not complaining, just always wanting better from my photos. 

Good to see that 2024 is off to a great start, let's hope this is a first of many new ticks for the list this year and a good sign of things to come. 

02/02/2024 Martin Mere WWT, Lancashire

Red-breasted Goose: Happy New Year. Here we are are in 2022 and I ended the year with 25 new lifers, putting me on 450. One of my most successful years with too many highlights to name.

No New Years outing with any birding chums, so instead it was a New Years day trip to Martin Mere with the family. The hope was to see the long staying RBG which was taken up residence on the Mere and I wasn't disappointed. 

Plastic fantastic or the real deal.....?

I saw this same bird back on the 3rd of December, on the edge of a vast salt marsh with tens of hounds of pink-footed geese. Seemingly acting like a truly wild bird, albeit it not with its peered carrier species such as Brent geese or white-fronted geese. 

Now its settled at Martin Mere and is feeding right in the open and close to the viewing screens, foraging on the grassy bank. it still comes and goes with pink-footed geese but now its showing this well.

A lovely looking bird but surely not doing itself any favours regarding its provenance! I know fly who have ticked it and I know some folk who still need it but won't entertain going to see it as its now acting more like one of Martin Meres captive birds.  

After watching the bird I headed back over to the park and collected dawn and Autumn before having a fun and enjoyable walk around the duck pens. 

Brambling: We eventually checked out the other hides were we had two marsh harrier and a nice kingfisher from the Harrier Hide.

Autumn was getting restless so we move don to the Janet Keir Hide.

It was here we had two brambling that were visiting the bird feeders, another reason I chose a New Years walk at Martin Mere. These brambling have been around for a few weeks now and if you get lucky and time your visit right they can be pretty showy.

So another year over and on to the next, what will be the big bird of 2024?