Devon Dude-ing

And what can be dude-ier than wandering around Stover?

Having some time in the middle of the day today, I tried Stover in the hope the sun would pull a repeat of yesterday's surprise swelterer.

No such luck.

I got rained on.

Ok, drizzled on, but still...

6 flavours of odonata, with one brave pair of Azures ovipositing, single Emperor and Common Hawker patrolling, and everything else cowering....

I did see some very nice birds though! At least 5 Bullfinches were using the feeder, plus Marsh Tits and a male GSW - he even showed off to a family [with an unusually quiet kid, 'tis true]. Plus hordes of Blue, Great, Coal and Long-tailed in all ages. There was also a very pretty Treeeecreeeper [not on the feeder, though!]

I'm not sure what to say....

Since my last post, some stuff's happened that has left me feeling.. well, I can't even put a proper word to it. I've not blogged since, as every time I've started running through a new post in my head, it goes wandering off to places unpostable...

Before I get onto that, I'd better update my doings; Not a lot! I've been pursuing jobs diligently, and bashing the patch and interrogating the local Herrings until they say 'Uncle!'. I got singed by the sun yesterday. Er.... Oh yeah, the rubber rainhood on my li'l scope's expired [it was a fancier one, and lasted almost a whole year... Grr] so I've found a metal one - its a bit short but after I added my custom armouring* it should do the job. Got it second hand from the wonderful Mifsuds [they deserve a plug] for 1/9 the retail [as new condition]. Next time you're in Brixham, pop in and have a browse - check out all the proper cameras they have...

*Li'l scopes, being made of plastic, and quite thin plastic at that, may split in two if dropped [though apparently if you stick them back together they still work fine - the prisms are held securely]. Being paranoid I've applied homemade armouring to the prism housing - layers of packing foam, duct tape and black electrical tape - though due to wanting to keep using the Grippa Case, I've not been able to cover all of it, so when on the shoulderpod it looks really weird...

Right then.

So, there was this gull. When I saw it on Saturday, everyone was happy with it. I suffered a touch of paranoia about the gonys, but on getting home I checked the bill morphology and saw that, yes, it was fine. Job's a good 'un, right?

Only people [who will remain nameless] had taken photos, and on looking at them saw something different to what was seen at the time. Could this be in fact a Yellow-legged? Photos were posted online, and people who hadn't seen the actual bird, and only had said photos to go on, said indeed it definitely was. By this time the bird had done a bunk, and I was left cursing not having taken more notes than I did - but back then the ID was secure and I had a teen-lister who wanted feeding [deary me..]

A very kind [and very nameless] gull expert of the proper scientific kind has sent me a paper on Caspians, which is very long and detailed and if I remember rightly says that you can only 100% ID them [ie. juvenile Caspians] by call and threat display. This is unfortunately of no use when the gull is resting, bathing and preening in a quarry and thus staying silent and not threatening anybody... From what I learn, it seems every other juvenile Caspian feature can be shown by Yellow-legged. Yes, even the white in the underwing. Possibly the blotchy boa too, though they were a bit vague about that one. I find this very inconvenient, and would like to know to whom I can complain! ;)

What I didn't learn is if any Yellow-legged can show ALL of the potentially shared features....

[[After all, Herrings can show all of the Yellow-legged Gull features, {I've seen three this week alone with more than one each} but never all of them at once]]

I am thus requesting that all of you who are reading this, ESPECIALLY if you saw the gull, to please comment and tell me why exactly this is a Yellow-legged and not a Caspian.

I am genuinely very curious about this - you cannot seriously ID a bird by jizz alone, there have to be criteria - thus there has to be something I'm missing.

It's Monday

Traditionally, I'm with Garfield when it comes to the subject of Mondays. They are evil, devious, and their effects can infiltrate the entire week - you may think it's Thursday, but Monday's power can reach out to vex you. Whatever field of enterprise you may be engaged in, be it work, relaxation, or dipping Kentish Plovers, Monday is gonna getcha...

And so it is, that I - sitting here now, ready after yet another failure on the job-seeking front - have been struck again. On Friday I had a long burble about dragonflies lined up in my mind, but not the time to unleash it upon your poor suffering retinas. Now I have the time but not the inspiration. I have tried, but the words didn't flow, and even I'm not that sadistic as to expect you to read that...

I do have a few other things to go on about, so maybe the dragons will return?

Dare you look down and see how long this post is?

I wouldn't - spoils all the fun.

Sunday was spent walking with the folks up on't Moor. Following my blog criteria for breeding raptors, the exact location has to remain unspecified, as the bird stars were a juvenile Buzzard playing with a juvenile Raven! Really. I've seen juveniles playing with their own species, or with birds they'd normally associate with, but never across the divide like this. They looked like they were having a lot of fun - soaring and chasing and tumbling around - at least until they were attacked by a Carrion Crow [which had flown from the next valley over to have a go, the git].

It was a warm, sunny day with a fresh breeze that stopped it being too uncomfortable to walk. In a high moor river valley there were multiple Golden-ringed Dragonflies - including a female munching on a beetle sp. with orangey-brown wing casings - several Beautiful Demoiselle and Large Red Damselflies, and a male Keeled Skimmer [which had a quick go at a male Golden-ringed before zooming off]. Still no Scarce Blue-taileds on the actual proper Moor, though... Lots of amphibians about - most notably two adult frogs and a toad. Not so many lizard!s, and as usual, no snakes of any kind..

There were a lot of sheep around, and Tilly was her usual.. er, 'enthusiastic' self, though she is slowly getting better. Very slowly. The sight of her being dog-marched past a bemused flock [Dartmoor sheep are mostly pretty laid back when they see your dog is on a lead] is both amusing and leading to the desire to smack her first owner upside tha heid...

All the usual moorland birds were present, with a couple of baby bands of mixed Wheatears, Mipits and Stonechats [though not Skylarks] giving the best views. It was an enjoyable walk - the longest one with Her Ladyship so far - the Moor as ever being glorious [though it being a sunny Sunday, not exactly quiet..]. It was drier than I expected, with all the rain over the last couple of weeks, which made for good going, though a few boggy bits were sneakily wet.

In other news, a dramatic moment as a juvenile Dunnock got itself trapped in the conservatory! The Sparrows wander in now and again, but [apart from the tragic male who got into the house itself earlier this year] always get out quite quickly. The Dunnock was acting more like the insects it was probably after and after several minutes, it was clear it needed some help. This proved stressful and complicated for all concerned, but eventually the young bird was freed, and after a few moments sat on the ground it flew off strongly. I hope its alright.

The first of the local Herring Gulls fledged on Thursday - watching it trying to work out how to flap its wings simultaneously, with the resulting zig-zag flight, had me in stitches... The small local House Martin colony is at least 4 pairs strong, I now know after finding a new vantage point [their nests are in an 'interesting' neighbourhood, where wandering around looking at peoples' eves in inadvisable...] and while I've been typing this another successful breeder gave us a noisy flyover. I like Swifts. :D I've started noting every evening that they're still here, to be sure I don't miss the exact departure date [like I did last year..]

Right then, dragonflies. Chasing a dragonfly yearlist [which, ok, I'm technically still doing] has led me to some very enjoyable moments between the prickles and the Horsefly attacks. Pike watching at Exminster, the dragonfly royal rumble at Stover, playing 'in plain sight hide and seek' with immature Black-tailed Skimmers at Aylesbeare, all the hawkers on the Levels, and pretty much every Golden-ringed full stop.... It wasn't what I expected when I started, not least that its been so quick. I suppose dragonflies are quick. The Hairys are gone already, with more to follow, and in two months they'll all be gone for another year.

Normally July is all about praying for strong winds and rain, but now I'm hoping for the opposite too - how weird is that? [[If you've met me, you'll get the joke in this ;) If not; lets just say I'm not a sunshine person..]]. Certainly I've found a new summer hobby - sitting beside some water, watching the odonata perform their multilevel ballet.

Yeah, that's it. My long long burble seems permanently excised from my mind, that above is all that remains. Kinda gets the point over, but I wish I could remember all the rhapsodising, I'm sure it was good.....

Vengeance is Mine!! Maybe.

EDIT: I'm leaving the original text as written, more edit-y stuff at the end.

Thanks to a dedicated gull-basher [you know who you are, and so does everyone else - WELL DONE!] I have finally seen an unequivocal, absolute, definite Caspian Gull!

YEEEEEES!!!!!!!!!

:D

You who have been reading this blog have seen only the tail end of a long, frustrating, and sometimes humiliating quest of mine - which isn't quite over, as I still want to find one myself [[masochist!!]] - the near-mythical Devon Caspian. I know its only a gull, and while its smarter than any Herring or Yellow-leg, its still a white-headed gull sp. that isn't an Audouin's... But there's something about Caspians, I think, a quality that makes them more special than the others - not so much the rarity, either - some balance of a plumage that's actually pretty, and proportions that seem right, you know? They make small beady eyes work.

Ok, stopping the larophilia....

It was another mid day phone call from Joe "What's a forward defensive shot???" Ray that started things, and as he'd cracked a metatarsal [or something] and was hobbling around on crutches, I gave him a door-to-door lift [being a Saint and so on... ;) ] over to Blackhill Quarry near Exmouth. We went more out of good form than expectation - gulls like flying off, after all - but lo and behold it stayed very put, and what a bird!

The Caspian was with a good sized mob of assorted Herring, LBB, and BHG of all ages and had the attention of a small group of Devon's Finest when we got there [no names, naturally]. We spent an hour admiring it, with bouts of Joe canvassing for gen on the Alps [maybe he should write a book - 'Birding on Crutches' - this is his fourth set, after all!] and everyone else taking the piss... :) Juveniles are a bit trickier than 1w [at least, when they sit still and pose nicely....] but still very distinctive once you got on it, and once you had easy to pick out again. The tertial thumbnails in particular stood out very much - between the dark tertial centres and very black primaries - letting you find the bird without optics [though I doubt this'll help in the future, you never know...]

I said no more larophilia, didn't I? I'll spare you my dragonfly burble, too [how nice is that?].

Caspian Gull. Brilliant!

EDIT: 2/8/10 So, it's been a week since the online photo issue started up - though it seems a lot longer... After doing a LOT of research, including the famous BB paper, I have given it a lot of thought and I cannot see how this bird was a "clear / obvious Yellow-legged Gull". People who know a lot more than me about Caspians in particular don't think it is one {a Caspian, that is}, but none of them [that I am aware of, please feel free to correct me] actually saw it. Still, I feel I can't say 'whatever..' to assorted Betters without firmer ground to stand on, so I'm downgrading it to a ? on my personal List.

Prickled.....

After all the fun of scarpering off up to zumerzet, this week has mostly been about diligent jobseeking to very little reward. I have had the time to give the patch a bash, with no results to speak of [other than the normal standard what you'd expect stuff, of course!].

This afternoon, I decided, on the back of what seemed like reasonable conditions, to pay a long overdue visit to 'the second best dragonfly site in Devon' [its what it says on its website, so it must be true! ;) ] - Little Bradley Ponds. I figured as it was over 20 degrees, but with sunshine and clouds, there'd be a fair chance of finding resting dragons between the sunny bits that might let me get a photo [I'm not becoming a photographer, btw, I'm just getting near the end of a film and enjoying playing with my paparazzi setup...] [[It needs to be kept in mind that there's a greater than 50% chance nothing will come out recognisable, also]]. Same website said there were Keeled Skimmers and Scarce Blue-tailed Damselflies - pretty blue ones to photo, and S B-Ts for number 30. Maybe. I was I admit a little skeptical that bogland damsels would be around old china clay pits come ponds, but it was worth a look.

Access is 'interesting' - an easily missed side road with parking a gateway that will fit two small cars. Just. This does mean its likely to be quiet, it also means the lack of foot traffic has helped to it get a bit wild in there... It wasn't impassable, but I have had the fun of pulling a 1.5cm gorse thorn out of my shin [ok, it was only 3/4 in, but still - ouch], and the brambles got their licks in too. It also looks like it gets pretty muddy. Ok, bad bits done - good bits! There were loads of insects, not just odonata, but lots of butterflies [and flies and grasshoppers and other things] too. The two ponds are very pretty, with each having a perimeter path and a little jetty so you can walk out and look down into the water for all the subsurface action [though I'd be careful with my weight - they look like they've been there a while]. If it wasn't for the busy road right there, it'd be idyllic.

The weather wasn't kind to me - early sunny patches were replaced by rain... Before the rain [and 4 degree temperature drop] I was able to see some dragons though; mostly damselflies, with the usual Common Blue and Azure [one unlucky male Azure got nobbled by one of those spiders that looks like a gorse flower] joined by Blue-tailed and lots of Emeralds. I didn't see a single Keeled Skimmer, and all the dragonflies were also singles - 4-Spotted Chaser, Emperor, and a male hawker sp. that was either Common or Migrant [I only got a side view and it didn't settle]. I found a male Beautiful Demoiselle sheltering from the rain [presumably flew over from the Bovey], and earlier, to my delight, was treated to the sight of a Blue-tailed and a Scarce Blue-tailed sitting on neighbouring rushes! The reason for the Scarce's presence was revealed to be the very boggy and open edge of the west pool [apparently it was designed for dragonflies when restored after china clay extraction ended] - there are similar boggy sides to the east pool, too, but it's older and more vegetated.

Needless to say, the little gits didn't sit for a photo - they let me get set up, then buzzed off... A couple of Emeralds were more obliging - including a nice pair - so we shall have to see. Emeralds were definitely the star performers - while I was standing under a beech, waiting to see if the rain was just a quick shower, one sheltered on a tall sword in front of me, and I was able to study its claspers with my bins - yep, definitely not a Scarce [let alone Southern! ;) ]. Birds were mostly pretty quiet - a few hirundines overhead - though a family of Treeecreeepers did their best to drown the traffic out! So cute.......

So, a little prickled and scratched, I have achieved the target I set myself, and done so before the end of July. Now what... Do I stop? Hell no! I've got the gotta catch 'em all phase out of my system, now its time to see them better! It's getting a bit late for more dragonfly blathering now, so I'll impose that on you next time and just end with a 'this ain't over' [[Cue: Threatening music "Dun Dun DUN...."]]

Sometimes things go right

Not often, mind, but sometimes. Today, as threatened, I was naughty and swanned off up to zumerzet looking for dragons - despite it looking a bit threatening first thing. Mission was to find Variable Damselfly, and hopefully also a 'red' Darter dragonfly sp. too, plus to get a look at female Little Bittern, and whatever else was about.

It did eventually rain, but it waited 'til gone half six, so no worries! Before that it almost hit 30 on the blazing hot Levels, and the dragons were everywhere! Having missed Variable Damselfly on my brief detour earlier this month, I was amazed that the first blue damsel I managed to get bins on proved to be one! Yes! :D This coming after I'd met an immature male Migrant Hawker, that stayed so put I was able to not only get my book out to make sure of the ID [I have no shame, and take my copy of Brooks & Lewington out with me....], but also to assemble my paparazzi setup [took it in the bag, deary me...] and get a shot from as close as my big lens will focus. He was more bothered by passing Brown Hawkers than by me - or the guy who came stomping past, then stomping back!

Also new for the year was Ruddy Darter - much more red and black than B & L indicate, a real stunner! - so I'm a Scarce Blue-tail away from my target. It's enough to make me a little giddy, I tell you!

I made three stops and got in eight and a half hours of field time, seeing 15 species of odonata and 50 species of birds [I think]. Star performers were definitely the Marsh Harriers - at least 5 individuals, the best being a 3cy male that put on a wonderfully prolonged display of hunting into the wind, with a pair of playing juveniles [one of which then tried landing in a small tree top and only just pulled it off..] coming a close second. Bitterns restricted themselves to two brief flight views - a Big one in exactly the same spot as one last Friday week, and the female Little one flying away from the site. A Great White Egret sighting was even briefer, and a Hobby didn't stick around either.

Did I mention how good the dragons were? On my way back from the Little Bittern, I got buzzed and examined by a Southern Hawker - face to face with an insect that's definitely looking back was an interesting experience! I was face to face with a Horsefly that settled on the rear hatch of my car as I opened it at Woodbury, but all I got then, as it turned to look at me, was 'target acquired'.. A Brown Hawker near Noah's Hide was much less interested - it seemed to think I was just moving scenery - while no Emperor has ever deigned to recognise I even exist! ;) A male Black-tailed Skimmer kept very neat pace beside me along a drove - I tried speeding up and slowing down to check - until I reached the edge of his territory. Interesting, that; a very odd co-incidence, it being disturbed by me [but the others I'd bothered just looped around behind me], or maybe behaviour adapted to moving animals disturbing prey? I have no idea, but I'd guess the latter. I also got to use the Big Scope [which I'd lugged along - thus the camera stuff in the bag] to ID damsels way out in the ponds - not very efficient [much better for watching birds] as the ones I got on were all Red-eyeds, Common Blues, and Azures!

Present all day, and perhaps causing the reduced Little Bittern sightings, were a LOT of helicopters. I think it must have been everything the Army hasn't already got in Afghanistan, and included Apaches! I've not seen them in person before, and it was jokingly mentioned that they were going to be on anti-egger duty next year - spot 'em on the thermal imaging and waste the scum with the chain gun... >;)

I was just getting back to my car when the first spit-spots of rain started [after waiting more than an hour for another Little Bittern flight] and the 5 degree drop in temperature as the front passed was most welcome on the drive home. Day's a good 'un.

Just the one

Believing the forecast and the way it was all sunny and stuff here, I went up on't Moor this afternoon looking for Scarce Blue-tailed Damselflies [again]. Needless to say, it wasn't quite so clement up there - strongish wind, lots of cloud and occasional drizzle made things seem pretty bleak [from a dragonfly perspective, anyway]. It did eventually sun up a bit, but the single odonata I saw was a male Beautiful Demoiselle.

S B-t 2 : Me 0

There were Wheatears, though they made themselves fairly scarce [no pun intended], and slightly-less-showy-than-yesterday Yellowhammers, and an absence of Horseflies [::Gives thanks::] so I can't complain too much.

Right, to bed. I have a feeling I might try something silly tomorrow - like a futile quest* up to zumerzet to look for Variable Damselfly amid the vast expanse of the Levels... [more Little Bitterns would be a purely accidental side-effect ;) ]

[[*Why futile? They look very much like Common Blue and Azure Damselflies - the two commonest ones! Not so much needle in haystack, as needle in needlestack.....]]