Good Birding Bad Birding

Because there are standards in birding.

Bashing your Patch regularly is good birding. Dutiful, honourable birding. Does you credit. Especially if you do it zero emissions [hey 'tis C21, folks], ie. on foot. 'Cos it's your Local Patch.

Ahem.


Burning vast amounts of dead things to see birds somebody else found on their Patch is naturally bad birding.

Especially when you're looking to put little ticks in lists.

Even if one is a First for the West Pal.....


Oh yes, it was a memorable Sunday.


It started with surprise blazing sunshine and flocks of Woodpigs, got all black and white, featured Epic rain, avoiding the Wrath of Farmer, and Two For One, and ended in stone.


Vaguely interested?

Female Great Spotted Woodpecker

You know it's likely to be a good day when the vocal GSW [most days] not only is visible [few days], but poses in the sunshine [unlikely] and lets you take pictures [ha ha]...

Female and male Bullfinch

Ditto!

Black Redstart!

Woo.

:D

Striking a pose

Not epic Woodpig numbers - mid hundreds total with only one big flock - and almost all passing inland, so seen en route to rather than from the Nose. Finches and pipits moving along the coast, but again nothing epic and Siskin the best sp. Still, three spp. of finch in one tree is quite nice to see.

Bull, Green, and Gold

Also a few new-up fungi, which will be in the dreaded fungusfest coming soon. Let's get on with birdies;

Oystercatcher roost
[how many do you see?]

With the Blackstart setting an example, the Rockits just had to join in;

Rock Pipit,

regular flavour

Rock Pipit,

imported variety?

You never see Rockits looking like this in the Summer here, I note.


Right, admiring the Blackstart delayed me a bit and so it was a bit 'argh!' when I got back home and found out that, despite clear skies and northerly [ish] winds, the pipits had stuck.

I had no choice. None at all.


[Yes, The Boss went to Pendeen and ignored them utterly, despite being just up the road, but he's just better than us weak mortals]


Sennen.

Well, once I got through epic levels of rain and the horde of Sunday drivers, anyway... [aaaaaargh]

And once I found the right lane to go up.


But the Paddyfield seemed to think it was a Buff-breasted Sandpiper and just swanned about in front of the twitch like there weren't a hundred-odd dodgy characters pointing a quarter of a million quid's worth of optics at it...  :)

Paddyfield Pipit: "Ullo. Got any chips?"

"How about you?"

"Check out the coverts"

Lots of legs

American Buff-bellied Pipit there, too

"It's a muddy Rockit" may have been said about that, but I thought it was quite fetching. Nice face pattern.

Having a stretch

The Wrath of Farmer had apparently been kindled in the morning - we were possibly technically on the wrong side of the field from the start of the footpath [it was where the birds were.. and a bit out of the weather {the two may be related}] - with the whole twicth being turfed off but as farmers are generally very easy going as long as you stay off the crop, I wasn't too worried. [[Having seen some pictures from said morning, I suspect this was what happened then, so served 'em right... Ahem.]]
Indeed no shotgun-toting individuals appeared [though a big bucket for donations would have been the ploy I'd have gone for :) ]


Despite it being a half-day twitch, and spending a fair while cooing over pipitses, I still had time to make a stop on my way home before the light went.

Boscawen-Un circle

The setting Sun

Creeg Tol

rock basin

A long day but a good day. Bad things may not always be good for you, but they sure can be fun.

;)

And that Paddyfield was something else. Yes, a scruffy little brown bird, but - as well as faster than a speeding autofocus - full of character. It even flew right along the twitch line calling that 'chup!' call. What a star.


Be Seeing You...