East Wind!

A bright sunny morning on the peninsular was deceptive as the wind was bitingly cold. With nothing passing off shore I had a wander around the beach. A Hare flushed in front of me and disappeared among the sea containers, the male Rubicola Stonechat was still present on the Gorse as was 3 Black Redstarts and a Wheatear, 2 Skylarks, 4 Meadow Pipits and 5 Pied Wagtails were also present.

The red head Goosander and 3 Goldeneye could be seen on a wind swept ARC from the causeway. The 2 Cattle Egrets were in the fields south of Brickwall Farm. At Scotney the drake Scaup was by the double bends per GH.
This evening at the Egret roost, 26 Little Egrets, 3 Great White Egrets and 2 Cattle Egrets came in to roost.

A slow watch!

Another fairly slow watch this morning in the company of AJG and BB.
06.00-09.15 From the seawatch hide:
Brent Goose: 1205 E
Common Scoter: 66 E
Red-breasted Merganser: 4 E
Red-throated Diver: 39 E
Fulmar: 2 E
Gannet: 44 E
Oystercatcher: 12 E
Dunlin: 2 E
Bar-tailed Godwit: 3 E
Kittiwake: 2 E
Mediterranean Gull: 1 E
Auk sp: 26 E
Thanks to AJG for collating the numbers.

A bitterly cold afternoon found the Cattle Egrets were still in the sheep field in Dengemarsh Road and the elusive Slavonian Grebe was still on Dengemarsh.
Late afternoon 220 more Brent Geese passed the fishing boats, 2 Wheatears, 2 Black Redstarts and 2 Stonechats including the stunning male rubicola were on the beach.  

Iceland 5th-10th March

 As soon as DW, GH, PB and myself picked up the hire car from the airport we drove the short distance to Keflavik where the White-winged Scoter was quickly located among a few Common Eiders, Red-breasted Mergansers and Black Guillemot. We then did another short drive round the bay to Helguvik Harbour, unfortunately security would not not allow us in, so we had to view the harbour from the top of the surrounding cliffs  where we were confronted by literally 1,000s of Common Eiders to trawl through with our scopes to find a drake King Eider which we eventually did, but the views were not really satisfactory. 

White-winged Scoter

Black Guillemot.

From Helguvik we drove to Reykjavik Harbour to hopefully see the Glaucous-winged Gull which hadn't been seen for a few days. We also failed to find it in the poor weather and failing light so made our way to our base at Grunadfjadur.

 DW scanning The Patch at Grundarfjordur sheltering from the wind and snow.

I managed to drive off the road and get stuck! Many thanks to the local police for pulling us out.

The weather was mainly atrocious heavy snow, strong winds every day and appalling light for photography, but the birding was brilliant particularly for white winged gulls. I have never seen so many Fulmars tens of thousands of them, wherever you looked out to sea or around the mountains they were wheeling around.

 Feeding by the fish factory sluice.

 We saw this King x Common Eider hybrid in the same place last year.

 Borealis Common Eider.

Up to 15 Harlequins were seen every day at Grundarfjordur.

A flock of 400+ Snow Buntings could be seen around the town.

All the images below were taken at Grundarfjordur unless stated otherwise.

 Iceland and Kumlien's Gulls

Adult Kumlien's Gull

 2w Kumlien's Gull

 Adult Kumlien's Gull

2w Kumlien's Gull

Adult Glaucous Gull

 Herring x Glaucous Hybrid?

Herring x Glaucous Hybrid?

2w Iceland Gull (Stikkisholmur) 

We also connected with a Gyr falcon here and drove back to Grundarsfjadur in a white out with nil visibility at times, at least DW managed to keep the car on the road, which was more than I did.

 1w Iceland Gull

Herring, Glaucous, Iceland, Kumlien's and a Thayer's candidate.

This gull was spotted the previous day by DW while I was looking at Eiders.

Thayer'sGull?

 Thayer's Gull?

White-tailed Eagle seeing off a Raven.

 This hybrid in Reykjavik Harbour was no compensation for the Glaucous-winged Gull.

On our last full day we ended up back at Reykjavik Harbour trying for the Glaucous-winged Gull again to no avail. We did see a Brunnich's Guillemot, Great northern Diver and a summer plumaged Black Guillemot.

 In the last hour before our flight home we went back to Helguvik harbour where 2+ Blue Fulmars showed very well among the 100s of Fulmars, 2 King Eiders were also found.

Back at Dungeness!

1 of 2 Firecrests in the lighthouse garden yesterday

With a light south easterly blowing this morning I spent a disappointing hour in the seawatch hide in the company of AJG and BB. A few Red-throated Divers, Gannets and Common Scoter flew up channel, along with 200+ Brent Geese, a Goldeneye and 3 Sandwich Terns which went past before I arrived. 

On the shingle between the fishing boats and the lifeboat 3 Wheatears, 5 Black Redstarts, 3 Skylark, 4 Meadow Pipits and a superb Rubicola Stonechat.
A Black-necked Grebe was at the southern end of the New Diggings and couple of Goldeneye on the ARC. Scotney was disappointingly quiet but at least the Cattle Egrets were still in Dengemarsh Road.
This afternoon a wander up to The Pines found just the 1 Chiffchaff in the Sallows but many Reed Buntings and Chaffinches, A Green Woodpecker was doing its best to bring down the telegraph pole behind the screen hide, while 2 Marsh Harriers quartered the Tower pits.
Walking from the ARC to the back of Hookers saw 2 Great White Egrets, 3 Little Egrets, a Bittern, more Marsh Harriers, c100 Golden Plover, 6 Tree Sparrows and 2 Bearded Tits. While I was at the back of Hookers, a call from CT about a Slavonian Grebe on Dengemarsh gave me the spur to make my way to the hide there. There was no sign of the Grebe from the hide but CT could see it from Springfield Bridge. I made my way round the Hayfields seeing another Great White Egret and 3 more Little Egrets along with 3 Redshank in them. Finally reaching Springfield Bridge I eventually got views of the Slavonian Grebe through the reeds as it became more elusive. While waiting for it to show again 2 Peregrines put in an appearance along with a Great White Egret and a Bittern seen only by PT.

Cattle Egrets!

Most of my day was taken up with domestic stuff but I did manage to catch up with the Cattle Egrets again.

R.I.P

Windswept Dunge!

07.40-08.40 from the sea watch hide:

Westerly 5 with showers:

Brent Goose: 95 E

Common Scoter: 5E

Red-throated Diver: 9E  3W  5 on sea

Great-crested Grebe: 6 on sea

Fulmar: 4W

Gannet: 20E  2W

Oystercatcher: 1W

Kittiwake: 1W

Auk: 3E  4W

Not the most exciting hour!

Herring Gull/Glaucous Gull Hybrid????

Another interesting Gull in the roost on The Point picked out by DW, looks like its got some Glaucous Gull in its lineage.

At a wind swept Scotney the 3 Black-necked Grebes were sheltering in the Kent pool, 2 Curlews and 50 Golden Plover could be seen on the turf along with the lonesome Barnacle Goose.

On Walland no sign of the Bewick Swans and Whooper Swan, presumably the Bewicks are on there way back to Russia. I have no idea about the Whooper!

The 2 Cattle Egrets were showing well in the ditch by the chicken sheds today! 

Early evening at the Egret roost 9 Littles, 4 Great Whites and 2 Cattle Egrets came in. While I was waiting 2 redhead Smew and a Goosander flew over, as did 6 Marsh Harriers.

Thin Fare!

 07.30-08.30 from the sea watch hide:
Brent Goose: 1w
Common Scoter: 4E
Red-throated Diver:  23E   5W
Great-crested Grebe: 14 on sea
Fulmar: 4W
Gannet: 4E
Kittiwake: 2W
Guillemot: 1E
Auk sp: 4E
At The Patch among the 100s of  Black-headed Gulls a striking leucistic individual was the only bird of note there.

Leucistic Black-headed Gull

In the Gull roost on The Point  a 1w Caspian Gull picked out by DW, as I got on to it and lifted the camera all the Gulls flushed and the Caspian flew off.
Another look at the sea this afternoon produced nothing in the very strong westerly winds.
The ARC from the causeway just a single red head Smew of note.
Burrowes Pit and Dengemarsh were very rough, apart from a couple of Marsh Harriers and Little Egrets, Shoveler, Gadwall and 5 Goldeneye little was seen here.
Scotney was more like an ocean with waves breaking over the islands and the wind howling across the turf, not surprisingly there was very little to be seen there.
The Cattle Egrets could be seen in the ditch by Brickwall Farm sheltering from the wind. 

March Blows In!

At Horsebones Farm this morning the Bewick Swan herd had diminished to 40 , the neck collared bird was still present as was the the Whooper Swan. The usual Sparrows,Finches and buntings could be seen at the feeders and seed dump. 1,000s each of Lapwing and Golden Plover filled the sky over Cheyne, probably flushed by Marsh Harriers or Common Buzzards. 

At Brickwall Farm the 2 Cattle Egrets were still wandering around the fields by the chicken sheds.

 At Scotney a Little Egret strutted it stuff on the flood pools, where another 50 Golden Plover fed.
An hour at The Patch saw c2,000 Black-headed Gulls, c20 Common Gulls, c200 Herring Gulls, c10 Lesser-black backed Gulls and c50 Great-black backed Gulls but no quality Gulls. A party of 17 Brent Geese flew east and just a handful each of Red-throated Diver and Great-crested Grebe were off shore, just 4 Gannets were seen.
On the ARC from the causeway 5 red-head Smew, 6 Goldeneye and still plenty of the common Wildfowl.

 Lapwing at Cockles Bridge

 Red-legged Partridge at Cockles Bridge now becoming scarce on the peninsular.

7 of the 14 Ruff

Back at Scotney this afternoon a party of 14 Ruff on the turf (the first this year on the patch) with 8 Dunlin, 10 Ringed Plover, 27 Golden Plover, 4 Oystercatcher, a Curlew and the Little Stint. On the lake the 3 Black-necked Grebes, a Peregrine put in an appearance flushing everything.

LEO!

On the way home last night after a day in West Sussex yesterday, I spent some time Owling on Walland, where a Long-eared Owl which flew across in front of me landed on a branch. I stopped the car underneath the branch just a few feet from the Owl, we stared at one another for 2-3 minutes before the Owl continued hunting. A brilliant moment and another patch year tick.
  
This morning a strong SW wind and drizzle greeted me at The Point where MH and CP were already in-situ:
07.10-10.00
Brent Geese:  415 up
Shelduck:  3 up  3 down
Pintail: 20 up
Common Scoter: 9 up
Red-breasted Merganser: 2 up
Red-throated Diver:     572  up    29 down
Great-crested Grebe: 49 down  6 on sea
Fulmar: 13 up      9 down
Gannet:  136 up     27 down
Cormorant:  c150 around
Oystercatcher: 7 up
Turnstone: 1 on beach
Kittiwake:  67  down
1w Glaucous Gull:  1 up (CP,MH) which I missed, I was probably doing the numbers!!!!!!!!!
Guillemot: 2 down
Auk sp: 86 down    14 up

As the weather deteriorated I had a look around the Gull roosts for the Glaucous Gull to no avail.
By the time I'd been home for breakfast, the rain had really set in and visibility was very poor so I called it a day.
It would appear all the usual birds were still be found around Dungeness despite the weather.