Longmynd - Golden Plover

Inspired by yesterday's sighting of Dotterel on farmland (which was not found after a late afternoon search) I thought I'd give the Longmynd yet another try?  Despite some heavy overnight rain, VP had nothing to excite so I headed up to a 'cloudy' Mynd.....

I gave all the usual areas a good grilling and the only highpoint was movement which I thought was..... No, not Dots but at least it was the next best thing up there at the moment - two gorgeous Golden Plover sporting their summer finery.......

Maybe more to come but these are probably representative? Oh well, Dots another year?

Venus Pool - Arctic Tern

The lull after (never mind before) the storm. One legacy appears to be yet another 'sticking' Arctic Tern! Given the light, it was difficult to get any images and  it wasn't the most automatic bird to id from photographs!

Images taken the two previous days were a bit confusing as the black bill tip coupled with an 'apparent' diffuse trailing edge to the wing gave it a 'Common' feel.....

These three images were from a consecutive burst and it's only at the extremes of the wing-beat that the 'solid' edge is convincingly apparent. The long tail streamers and translucent primaries (all of them) are there though!

The upperwing shows the classic plain grey appearance. I just love Terns as they bank with the tail feathers splayed out :-)

A 'Black' would be nice? I keep saying that......

The perfect storm - big wader day!

Other than keeping me awake for most of the night, I underestimated just how big an impact the deluge was going to have on the wader passage through Shropshire! It was a text from Martyn Owen that got me kick started and then had to somehow battle through gridlocked traffic!

Eventually I made it to VP where 2 Sanderling, 29 Dunlin and  2 Ringed Plover were waiting (I'd missed a Black Tern plus 3 Arctics passing through!).

Here's the waders. It was impossible to get them all in the frame but some nice counts here! (some bigger images than normal!)

One of the two Sanderling taking centre stage!

By 9.30, the Dunlin count had reached 37 - surely the highest for the reserve. Most of them plus Sanderling are here......

Tom Lowe and Martyn Owen had gone on to Long Lane and Chelmarsh with impressive wader counts coming out including a lifer Turnstone for MO at Chel (nice find eh!) Having been joined by Mike Stokes, we opted to check what wader megas might be lurking in the north of the County. Answer: absolutely none!! Too much water at Wood Lane and Whixall meant absolutely nothing doing and all we came away with were 2 Common Terns on Colemere!

A check of  VP after lunch and the original wader flock had cleared out at 10.30, only to be replaced later by another 13 Dunlin plus 1 Sanderling but the weather was now quite settled. Would the Turtnstone still be at Chelmarsh?? We set off and 40 mins later were totting up 1 Turnstone, 8 Sanderling, 4 Dunlin, 1 Redshank, 1 Common Sand on the dam plus 3 Common Tern, the scrape looked good but was empty.....

We just had to check Long Lane next. Goodness only knows  why this flooded field has become a wader hotspot, presumably the presence of waders attracts even more!! It's also 'out of the way' and the birds don't get disturbed! An initial scan indicated that the count here was going to top the lot so far and MS picked out a summer plumage Knot! Repeated counts eventually confirmed we were looking at 1 Knot, 63 Dunlin, 6 Sanderling, 15 Ringed Plover plus 2 Oystercatcher, 2 Curlew plus at least 4 Lapwing. 

The 'perfect storm', the'Big Day'......., superlatives peppered the news services as Twitter went into overload and for once Shropshire was head and shoulders ahead on the Midland scene!

I ended the day with an evening check of VP where 1 Sanderling, 13 Dunlin and an Arctic Tern remained. I've not added these to the day tally at three sites for MS and myself......

Turnstone, Knot, Redshank, Common Sand 1 each

Sanderling 17 

Dunlin 117 

Ringed Plover 17

LRP 2,  Curlew 2 ,  Lapwing 4 , Oystercatcher 6.....

One of the Dunlin.....

Two of the Dunlin!

Dunlin with Sanderling!

One Sanderling and one heck of a day to remember!

All I can say and I've said it before (sorry Sir Alex) Shropshire Birding - Bloody Hell!

Westport lake - Black-necked Grebe

I knew I would crack and renege on my Shropshire vigil at VP etc for..... what? Absolutely nothing apart from Dunlin and Ringed Plover, oh and a Common Tern,  over the past week. So, when something tasty like a summer plumage Black-necked Grebe turns up within 40 miles, it sort of got my attention! Foolishly I didn't check the weather forecast - just went......

And it rained and rained and alas, with the Grebe saw showing down to 15m in the white water gloom, it was frustration ++.  Birding in near monochrome!

Here's a couple of images from one of the less wet moments - there may not be many more?

You can see why I went!

Venus Pool - Waders!

An astonishing five species of wader today! Before you get too excited, that includes Lapwing, LRP and Oystercatcher! Oh well 2 Dunlin and 1 Ringed Plover were a welcome addition.....

Here's one of the Dunlin coming close

With the Ringed Plover.....

They got along famously, the same can't be said for RP / LRP combination however!

Whichever way round, the body language speaks volumes!

Then straight into all out combat.....

No Plovers were hurt during the filming of these images :-)

Venus Pool - Dunlin

The wind was howling, low cloud...... surely something might drop into VP? Yeah but only two Dunlin which were there all day.

Having a rest after furiously feeding up!

I did say it was windy....

Whoops.....

Wood Lane - Common Tern

Had a bit of a session with Mike Stokes today in the hope of 1. Dotterel, 2. A decent wader, 3. A Tern. We failed miserably on points 1 and 2, getting soaked too in the search for 1 in low cloud and rain....

The only vague success was a Common Tern at Wood lane, which made a nice change from the recent influx of Arctics! Here's a composite sequence of manoeuvres as it plucked flies from the water surface.

Cruising along....

Banking into the turn

Then, into the dive.....

There was nothing of note at Venus Pool, Colemere, The Mere, Whixall Floods or Long lane!