A Slow Spring

We are already experiencing summery days but I have so far seen little of much interest.

About a week ago people started reporting occasional buff-tailed bumblebees and the odd butterfly.  I noticed three of the buff-tailed bumblebee queens in the garden on Monday and a couple more since but no sign yet of the red mason bees that live in the bug hotel and so far no butterflies at all.  Interestingly several records of the brimstone have been registered in the Darlington area and one as far North as Sunniside.  It would be great if one of those turned up on my travels

Again I'm regretting the lack of garlic mustard in the garden, once prolific and a food plant for the orange tip and green-veined white until I decided it was getting out of hand and uprooted virtually the whole lot.

Apart from an increase in blackbirds and robins, collar doves have been fairly frequent visitors, fleeing into the trees at the back if they caught my attention.

Collar Dove

I remember being excited when they first turned up as a mystery in our garden in Blyth in the early eighties, having only recently established a presence in the area.

A bike ride to Matfen a fortnight ago produced a sighting of a yellowhammer and hearing my first chiffchaff, which are now singing out all over the place as they do.  On several occasions I have also heard greenfinches in the tree tops but so far haven't seen one.

Perhaps the most interesting thing I did see was crawling around in the summer house rather than in the garden itself.

Green Lacewing

Nothing special and I have had lacewings before in the Spring, but I rather like them and daresay the trout in the Derwent like them too.

A Good Decision

While writing up my sightings in Spain, I had a couple of sightings South of the Derwent.

On my way to the Metrocentre, about half a dozen roe deer crossed the Derwent Walk a hundred yards ahead of me, including two fawns perhaps suggesting that they are becoming more numerous, as I suppose tends to happen with deer.

I couldn't believe my ears after collecting my first hearing aid at Shotley Bridge on Friday, but then I couldn't believe my eyes either when I saw this heron above the road on the way home:

Grey Heron

Now I'd heard of Leonard Cohen's "Bird on a Wire" but a heron on a wire was total news to me.  I gather the fishing on the B6310 isn't much good these days unfortunately.

Lapwing

My plan on Sunday was to do a long cycle ride to the coast given the forecast of long hours of sunshine.  When the latter had not materialised by 10.30 am I decided to do a few jobs in the garden then spend a couple of hours at Shotton Pools near Northumberlandia, where there have been a few sightings recently.

The whole area was alive with skylarks singing their heads off and there were a good few lapwings around. 

A couple of cheps told me a tundra bean goose had been sighted with some pink-footed geese in the fields.  

I reckoned I managed to see it.  They'd all disappeared briefly and I was quite surprised when they showed up again that I could pick them out at distance with the naked eye, so I had a go at getting a group shot, with the impromptu intervention of a couple of hares. 

Tundra Bean Goose(l), Pink-footed Goose with hares

My bird handbook points out the elongated neck on the bean goose.  It should really show a black tip to the beak but maybe it's not apparent at several hundred yards range.

Avocets have been turning up in Northumberland for a fair while but today I counted six and there were probably a few more, so that was new.

Avocet

A very graceful bird...

On the way back to Northumberlandia, one or two of the lapwings were starting to rehearse their display flight and call.  I didn't manage to capture this example very well, but it was easier than trying to keep up with all the skylarks.

Lapwing rehearsal

One that I didn't catch up with was the white-fronted goose but I saw them once before at Loch Ken.  

All in all I had taken a good decision. 

Spain - Day 7 and Afterthoughts

Typical!  I completely forgot to mention that we ended Day 6 with a visit to the reservoir at Embalse de Calcono de Guarra in another attempt to catch up with the wallcreeper and one was actually spotted by the guides flying over the dam wall before disappearing totally from view as before.  I think only one other person saw it, which definitely wasn't me. Meanwhile a honey bee on a stone bench was looking decidedly unhealthy.

We were back there again early today but again drew a blank in terms of the wall creeper and the honey bee had died. But I did get as a good a view of the many swooping crag martins, which the video unfortunately doesn't do much justice to:

Crag Martins in flight

It was however as close a view of them as I have ever had.

It wasn't too long before we moved on, spotting another another short-toed treecreeper (how do you tell the difference?) near an ancient bridge before settling for lunch at Embalse de Calcono de Guarra.  Afterwards one or two continued to survey the cliffs for the missing wallcreeper while most took a (somewhat hazardous looking path) to see the local cave art, while I mainly foraged in the fields in the expectation of finding a few butterflies.

Actually it was the walkers who found some butterfly action rather than me, even though the crocuses were out.  What I did see was some more grasshoppers and several four-spot ladybirds, apparently common in the area.

Crocus

Grasshopper

Four-spot Ladybird

From there we went to Calle Baye to see the European tree of the year 2021 - a massive holm oak that dates to way back and was too wide to capture in less than three shots.

Part of the Holm Oak

Walking there we did spot a nice clouded yellow that was passing quickly through a field.

But from there it was back to Alquézar for a last ditch attempt on the largely missing wallcreeper.

Unfortunately want we got was more of what we already had, mainly griffon vulture, blue rock thrushes, and a black redstart.  The main excitement was caused by some egyptian vultures flying over the capella, not however for me as I saw them in France. 

Still perpetually surveying the capella and surrounds, I was quietly delighted when a chough landed on the roofing and showed really well:

Red-billed Chough

It was the best view of a chough I've ever had.

As everyone was thinking about packing up, there was a last minute mystery.  I thought I saw another blue rock thrush heading towards a large fissure in the rock face - except that it clearly had russet red underparts.  It settled briefly then flattered around a bit before disappearing into the fissure.

The only possibility I could think of was common rock thrush, which is listed as being a passage bird in the area.  However our guides thought they would all still be in Africa.  With the group already making it's way back to the vans there was no opportunity to wait around for more action.  It'll have to remain as 'unidentified.'

Overall Reflections

I've counted up and reckon I've seen 16 new species of bird, 2 new species of bee and 1 new moth so overall a great success and that excludes Dupont's Lark (heard) - a great experience and the session at the vulture feeding added a sense of theatre.  The holiday held plenty of interest without me feeling overloaded (once I'd got over the jetlag.)  Even though I only saw the wallcreeper at distance, it counts. The general view was the lack of further sightings was just down to rotten luck.

Also I can say that I learned a good deal about using my newish camera, especially for long distant shots.

However the trip confirmed my growing opinion that I'm not a great birdwatcher.  I just don't see things well and in particular found the larks hard to spot. My equipment isn't really up to scratch either but I'm not keen on lugging a scope and a mirrorless camera with a huge lens around with me all of the time.

I think I should probably stick with what I seem to be best at - namely butterflies and bees and save the birds for the winter when there are few insects and for any oddities turning up in the area.

Spain Day 6

The day started well with another (for me) significant sighting when this cirl bunting was spotted in the garden.

Cirl Bunting

Once again the early morning light made the colouration hard to see but this bird does not occur in the North and was a definite a 'lifetime first.'  Again it's not looking in the right direction.

But today was principally the day when we were scheduled to meet the griffon vultures at the Sierra de Guarra where they are regularly fed in large numbers by an elderly Spanish chap and a younger woman I assumed to be a relative of his.  The gen was that the vultures would have no qualms about taking the lamb carcasses offered and there would also be Lämmergeier that would hover above before moving in to eat up the bones.

Unfortunately we were delayed by an hour, having been sent on a massive diversion to avoid a landslip and by then almost of the Lämmergeier had given it up as a bad job.

The temperature was up to around 15-16C and so there were a couple of butterflies sunning themselves on the track towards the feeding spot - a silhouette of a green hairstreak and a speckled wood.

Green Hairstreak

Speckled Wood

The speckled wood is the darker aegeria form rather than the lighter tircis form generally seen in the UK.

Once into the reserve, there was evidence of the bait put out for the Lämmergeier with the uneasy appearance of a pagan offering.

Lämmergeier bait

When we got there we had to sit down and stay silent and then:

An everyday story of vulture folk

Of course it wasn't all harmony and light:

A squabble

As the hungry hordes gradually ran out of  dead meat to fight over, some opportunist ravens took the opportunity of hoovering up the scraps.

Raven

After the excitement we headed for lunch near Calla Unica where I foraged a bit in the car park finding the first buff-tailed bumblebee I've seen this year, some beeflies that were notably smaller than the one I see in the garden (dark-edged beefly) and the one seen on Day 1. There were also some mini-mining bees, though as ever identifying them would be completely another story.

The spot we chose offered a view back over the vulture feeding zone in the hope of sighting the Lämmergeier and, just when it looked like we wouldn't succeed, a few eagle-eyed (no pun intended) members of the group found a couple, one showing up nicely in the distant sunlight.

Lämmergeier

Near our next destination we came across another bird I had never even heard of before, let alone seen - a black wheatear.

Black Wheatear

It followed the trend set by earlier sightings in presenting a view from the rear.

The next stop was in the heights at the Castillo Montearagon, on top of which there were a lot of chough, which mainly flew off as we drove in.

I got a nice but unnewsworthy photo of a meadow pipit and more interestingly a nutmeg moth and what i believe to be a long-horned bee:

Nutmeg Moth

Long-horned Bee

I've submitted the bee photo to a couple of local experts but neither has responded.

While all this was going on, I hadn't realised that the others had found a couple of dartford warblers and scrambled around a bit to at least get a fleeting sighting of yet another bird I hadn't seen before.

All in all, a pretty profitable day.

Spain Day 5

Today was to be the day we caught up with the wallcreepers on the cliffs at Alquézar.  

But first a post-breakfast stroll in the hotel gardens showed it was good for finches too, notably a couple of greenfinches and as many hawfinches as I've ever seen in the same place:

Greenfinch

Hawfinch

It's only the third time I've seen hawfinches. The early morning light from behind doesn't do justice to the colouration of either bird.

When we got to Alquézar I must admit I was pretty much bowled over by the first views of the place - it looked stunning!

Alquézar

So after a brief tramp through the town we settled down on the seats opposite the cliff face for a full day vigil.

Quite quickly someone managed to spot a blue rock thrush, which of course I didn't manage to see until someone else pointed it out in painstaking detail.  Once I found it the picture I got at considerable distance suggested I'd done the right thing by changing the camera settings.  A first for me, it was to turn up periodically through the day.

Then around 11.00 am the wallcreeper was spotted at the far left edge of the cliff face, only for it it disappear behind the cliff edge almost as soon as it had appeared as the rest of the group hurried over to see if they could get it in a 'scope or camera.  And I did actually see it, but just as a tiny black speck against the horizon that I could never have identified.  Then it was gone behind the cliff edge.

I think we assumed it would return.  When it didn't, we moved behind the capella to survey the rocks on the other side.  Here there were quite a few things to be seen - a perching griffon vulture, sardinian warbler, and notably alpine accentor...

Alpine Accentor

Sardinian Warbler

... whereby I'm only showing the warbler because it's the first time I've managed to capture it.  It flew off before I went for the close-up.

After lunch the vigil continued.  Various birds turned up including a lot of vultures on a thermal, a peregrine falcon, numerous crag martins, black redstart and rock dove.

At one point I saw a single honey bee near the foot of a wee tree where we were standing.

I had noticed that most people were surveying the main cliff and the left hand edge where the wallcreeper first appeared.  So I decided to focus on the castella and the right hand cliff where it was known that the wallcreeper had landed on previous occasions.

Well all I got for my pains was more crag martins and blue rock thrushes, though it was fascinating to see how the ivy growing up the rock had been colonised by a mass of blackcaps that kept appearing and reappearing.

Blue Rock Thrush

Blackcap (female)

I think we jacked it in around 5.00 pm.  I later jokingly remarked that we should have persevered for another hour or so but I don't think it went down too well.

In a later debriefing session, one of our guides pointed out that the alpine accentor was a much rarer bird than the wallcreeper.

You win some and lose some I suppose.  At least I can claim I saw both, which not everyone did.

Spain - Day 4

Last night one of the group leaders noticed there was an egyptian grasshopper sitting on the fence outside the hotel.

Having turned down another early hours search for Dupont's Lark in even colder conditions, I took a look this morning and it hadn't moved, very large and looking like something out of a nightmare.

Egyptian Grasshopper

Today we were on the move to our second hotel in Huesca. En route we stopped at a wee lake, where a large numbers of chiffchaffs were indulging in flycatching activities from the reed beds.  You can just about see them in this video:

Chiffchaffs

I must say I've not seen them in numbers in such a location or behaving like this.  Maybe it's a European thing?

At another brief stop I got a brief spot I got a shot of a calandra lark, which would have been great if it had been polite enough to face in the right direction.

Calandra Lark

We were heading for the reserve at El Planeron by which time we could see the changed scenery looming up like a moon landscape ahead.

The Sierra

We were now 1000 metres lower than Gallocanta and the change in temperature was noticeable, also bringing large numbers of butterflies - all of them whites.

  

Once we stopped, I got a nice view of an early season small white as well as the predominant flower common stork's bill according to Google Lens..

Small White

Common Stork's Bill

On going up a hill on the other side of the road I noticed a butterfly that I thought might be a blue.  In fact what I was seeing was the greenish underwing of the bath white, which were present in good numbers though extremely mobile.  I also spotted large white at distance as did another group member.

I was wondering about the possibility of southern small white, which are definitely possible in Northern Spain but saw none.  It makes me think how lucky my sighting north of Tübingen was a couple of years back although they have now been reported in the Southern UK. 

Further along the reserve we stopped again and someone spotted an Iberian Grey Shrike far off on the other side of the road.  I didn't see it until it moved.  

The group then concentrated on a Dupont's Lark audible to the South East of us but I reckoned it was moving more to the South and headed that way along a rough track. 

Noticing a marshy area and having heard some frogs to my right I took a look and saw the (or another) Iberian Grey Shrike perched in the branches, looking like an elongated version of the great grey shrike we sometimes see at home. I carefully got the camera ready and... the only other car we saw there that session rumbled down the dirt track and flushed the shrike!

It flew around a bit and returned briefly to its obvious favourite perching area a couple of times but was obviously spooked and didn't settle.

Huesca Emblem

Meanwhile some of the group who had followed down the track caught sight of the Dupont's lark
hovering at height near some raptors and eventually diving back down.  I took two or three looks through the binocs but couldn't see a _______ thing.

Further on again there was a short-toed lark near Belchite and I was quite concerned to see this huge aggressive-looking horned creature on the horizon entering the Huesca region.

Apparently it's quite common as we saw images of several others.

Nearing the hotel, a flying raptor was identified as red rather than a black kite and I at last got an image of a raptor in flight as well as a shot of a cerin in a tree with some others.

Griffon Vulture

Cerin

Frankly I doubt if I would have identified the cerin from the photo but the photo needed tweaking as the light was pretty dodgy and it was the first one I'd seen since visiting Austria several years ago.

More of vultures later... 

Spain - Day 3

We set off in the wee small hours again the next day, this time in search of the secretive Dupont's lark.  Its shyness meant us standing in line motionless on the site off the road to La Yunta in near freezing temperatures. Well we heard it clearly enough but it seemed to have disappeared by the time there was reasonable light and we only saw one or two bits and bobs on the way back for breakfast. 

Setting off again in the van we stopped briefly for some common cranes that were posing nicely in a field, not daring to get out in case we disturbed them.

Cranes posing

This was on the way for a walk in the hills near Tornos looking for larks, which were well-camouflaged and the one I definitely saw was Thekla's Lark.  Unfortunately my photography skills were again much challenged as many sightings were at considerable distance and several photos came out blurry.  Hopefully I can find an app to rescue some of them

Later we headed to the other side of the laguna, where there were some flamingos at reasonably close range, mainly keeping their heads down.  I think this is the best view I've had of flamingos to date.

Flamingos

There were a good deal of both marsh and hen harriers around and another walk near Las Cuerlas, after a period of seeing bits and pieces at distance, we hit on an area where a large number of raptors were flying overhead, almost as if participating in an air display.  In addition to those already encountered, they included a totally new sighting, the black-shouldered kite (never heard of!) and, almost as an afterthought, a couple of golden eagles...

Of all of them I got nothing but blurry silhouettes so it was a bit of a surprise, on returning to the lagoon near Dirigida, that I managed to get a passable shot of a mass of cranes right on the far side of the lake, many hundreds of yards away.  I must have got the zoom spot on for once.

Cranes at distance

When we first got there, there was also a nice white wagtail close by but the main birds in evidence where great and cattle egret, the latter showing no yellow as still in winter plumage.  I learned you can still tell them apart by the fact that the great egret has a much longer neck.

Great Egret

Cattle Egret

White Wagtail

Great egrets are starting to be seen in the North of England but cattle egrets are still a rarity, though I saw lots of them in the West Indies.  The white wagtail is also infrequent.

However the strangest thing we saw on stopping further down was three roe deer that had apparently decided to swim the whole length of the lagoon in very cold water.  We saw the last part of their journey, lasting several minutes with one pulling ahead to leave the other two straggling behind.

Roe Deer

Also sighted in this area and on the way back to the hotel were: little bustard, stonechat, linnet (lots of), black redstart and spanish sparrow.

In the evening I had a bit of reflection on the photography angle and decided to increase the focal length of the birdwatching auto facility on the camera.

Of course serious birdwatching photographers will tell you you really need to use manual settings...

Spain - Day 2

Oh dear, what a catastrophe!

At teatime on day 2 perhaps still jetlagged after getting up at 3.15 am on Monday to make the flight from Stansted, I managed to permanently delete all the photos I had taken during the day including good views of some notable first time sightings.  So all I can do is tell the story of what I saw without the evidence.

The day started well before dawn when we drove a few miles to an observation post at the Southern corner of the lake.  It was still pitch dark but after half an hour, vague shapes could be made out and I used the moon setting on my camera to see lines and lines of cranes in the distance...

The story with the cranes is that they gather on the Laguna di Gallocanta before migrating northwards across the Pyrenees. Each day at this time of year some will make the flight, some will remain and others will move in.  

So as the light improved, they started to move off in increasing numbers, flying straight over our heads in an overwhelming display except for one lone individual that came back.  Someone joked that it must have forgotten something.

We were told that there were around 15,000 cranes in the area on the day but the hotel organised a competition for us to guess how many there would be on the last day of our stay, just before the start of the "crane weekend" when most are expected to make the move north.  The number counted on that Friday was over 27,500, many more than any of us guessed!

Also seen on or the lake were some distant flamingos, shelduck, shoveler and teal as well as calandra lark, merlin and marsh harrier nearby.

Later in the day we travelled around a bit seeing crested lark, several linnets rock sparrow and roe dear. indeed it was going along in the van that led to a spectacular sighting when one of the guides saw two great bustard crossing behind us in his mirror as he drove along!  They disappeared straight away but we caught up with them again by circling around and managed good views. 

Something similar happened not much later when a bird of prey flew out of a tree in front of the advancing van.  Some thought buzzard and some thought marsh harrier but it flew off speedily to a corner of a distant field, where it could eventually be identified as a booted eagle

You can see why I was fed up about deleting the images.

I did manage one photographic capture that evening. In a garden near the hotel there was a bush full of twittering birds, which could only be seen fleetingly as they left and entered the foliage so I tried without much success to video them:

Tree with invisible birds

The Merlin app suggested spanish sparrows but I think not. Bog standard house sparrow is I think the correct answer.  I later learned that spanish sparrow is a more rural species.

Spain Day 1

As mentioned briefly last time, I spent last week in holiday in Northern Spain. It was a birdwatching trip, Wallcreepers and Cranes in Northern Spain with Naturetrek.  The overall verdict would have to be that, while the cranes were available in massive numbers, the wallcreepers proved distinctly elusive and I only got one distant view.  Inevitably though, I saw a lot of birds that were new to me.  I was also attracted by the fact that previous trip reports indicated that there could be a few butterflies...

Day 1 - 11th February

Painted Lady

It became quickly clear after landing at Zaragoza that Spring weather was in the air and we we quickly saw the first griffon vultures, red kites and others from the vans.  After stopping at Daroca, we took our first walk up to the Torre de San Valero, and evidence of butterflies was soon apparent as we saw small white, large white and bath white flying around early on.  As we got near the tower a good number of painted ladies and red admirals.  My suspicion has been for a while that painted ladies can overwinter in the UK and you'd think these must have done so in Spain.

An even better surprise was the appearance of a scarce copper butterfly within the tower wall. I also found a beefly and a bee the apps have identified as Gwynne's Mining Bee, which seems credible enough to me and one I've never seen before.

Gwynne's Mining Bee

This is by no means to say there were no birds around and the ones I saw (others saw more) were crossbill, crag martin, short-toed treecreeper and some singing woodlarks singing above the power lines.

However, the biscuit was duly taken by another butterfly when we saw a queen of spain fritillary sunning itself on a boulder.  This again surprised me but it appears it can be on the wing throughout the winter months.

Queen of Spain Fritillary

We then set off for our first hotel at Allucant on the Laguna di Gallocanta, which is a massive, shallow salt lake and the key winter destination for cranes.  At 1,500 metres above sea level, winter temperatures still applied but during daytime were still well above those being experienced in the UK.

Having not managed to get any decent bird photos, I was well pleased when we came across some corn buntings in the fields near the hotel and in fact they were all over the trees on the way to the laguna.

Corn Buntings in field

Corn Bunting in tree

I reckoned I could see several blackbirds in the trees but in fact they turned out to be spotless starlings (never heard of!) and indeed you can just about make out the iridescence in the snap I got of this one:

Spotless Starling

And what of the cranes?  Well, we could just about make out a few obscured in haze at considerable distance towards the South end of the lake, which was to be our next destination 

Quiet Days

I haven't been active much lately, the reason being that there hasn't been much ado.

The rarities that were showing up on the run-in to Christmas aren't showing up any more with the exception of gulls (which don't interest me overmuch) and an american pipit which is a long way off in North Northumberland and it seems to me not worth chasing when I probably wouldn't have been able to distinguish it from the other pipits that occur on the coast.

Nuthatch

The garden has provided the normal fare with the long-tailed tits visiting if sporadically and the nuthatch still appearing almost daily.  I hear the long-tailed tits quite a lot in the Derwent Valley.

The Big Garden Birdwatch again passed with low numbers and birds that I would normally expect to see not turning up, including the pair of collar doves that have landed now and again.  The overall totals (maximum seen at any one time) were:

Jackdaw 3, Woodpigeon 2, Robin 2, Blue Tit 2, Blackbird 1, Coal Tit 1.  Nothing to write home about but this seems to be normal for the past few years.

Bike rides and car trips have produced vary little apart from the odd bird of prey.  

I did finally get out for half an hour at Lamesley Pasture at lunchtime today.  Here there was a large number of greylag geese, possibly 100, and around 20 moorhens digging around in the bankside mud, which is as many as I've counted at once.  A couple of them looked like they might be males getting feisty with each other in preparation for the breeding season.

Moorhens

Otherwise the main thing with wings that could be seen in the distance was the Angel of the North.

I should have more to report in ten days after my latest nature trip in Spain, with which I hope to bridge the transition from winter to spring.