Great Grey Shrike, Bradbury

Following on from the Swans at Sadberge, I made the short trip to Bradbury where I enquired about the presence of the shrike.  A group of birders in a parked car had had no joy scanning the hedge north of the railway line, so I started scanning the general field boundary and picked it up near the farm at first.  It then flew to the hedge by the A1 - some distance hence the poor record shot!

Bert Mitchell, John Money and a few others turned up just as I located it.



Great Grey Shrike, Bradbury
3 January 2014

A nearby flock of gulls contained Black-headed, Common, Herring and Lesser Black-backed.

Here's one I made earlier! Just a little bit closer :-)



Great Grey Shrike, Hartlepool Headland
10 October 2010

Staveley YWT

A family trip to Staveley (a recently expanded YWT reserve near Boroughbridge) late this morning with the family was quite fruitful with views of Water Rail from one of the East Lagoon hides.



Water Rail

The other highlight was picking up a Marsh Tit when chatting with Maurice Local.

Surprisingly no Yellowhammer, Siskin or Redpoll before heavy rain put the dampers on things.

Foot It 2014 begins

We're off! The first bird of 2014 for me was a Woodpigeon...

Nothing earth-shattering, but the Foot It list is up and running and stands at 22 species:

Woodpigeon 

Robin

Blackbird 

Jackdaw

Great Tit

Collared Dove

Chaffinch 

Blue Tit

House Sparrow

Dunnock

Goldfinch 

Carrion Crow

Redwing 

Tree Sparrow

Mistle Thrush

Wren

Long-tailed Tit

Fieldfare

Rook

Starling

Greenfinch

Black-headed Gull

A mixed winter thrush flock gorging on my neighbours' apple windfall was good to see, but couldn't match the 26 Blackbirds present yesterday. There were Redwings and Fieldfares in the mix though.

Newburgh Priory today - Barnacle Goose

Numbers a bit different to my last visit in November, with today's highlight being a Barnacle Goose. Still no joy with Green-winged Teal or Ring-billed Gull etc. but you've got to try!



3 Mute Swan
30 Canada Goose
215 Greylag Goose
1 Barnacle Goose
116 Teal
2 Wigeon
142 Mallard
15 Moorhen
1 Pheasant
67 Black-headed Gull
8 Common Gull
1 Pied Wagtail
2 Redwing and 1 Fieldfare in a field towards Byland Abbey

Newburgh Priory, Friday

A quick visit to Newburgh priory on Friday afternoon on the way back from Flamborough was productive in terms of numbers of waterfowl and gulls:

3 Mute Swan
30 Canada Goose
48 Greylag Goose
93 Teal
12 Wigeon
252 Mallard
2 Tufted Duck
18 Moorhen
10 Pheasant
107 Black-headed Gull
153 Common Gull

Quite a sight and noise on such a relatively small lake!

Wader go!

Starting to see a bit of autumnal wader passage with a cracking moulting Curlew Sandpiper on the Tidal Pool today along with Bar-tailed Godwit, Ruff, Redshank, Avocet.

Thrush Nightingale, Hartlepool Headland

What a great bird. Possibly the South Gare bird from during the week?