Low Force and High Force Wind

On Saturday I joined up with Jennifer and Joe who are walking the Pennine Way in stages.

We met at Middleton-in-Teesdale to do the section to High Force.  Unfortunately I 'hit the wall' at about four miles and only made it to Low Force, the easy access to High Force from the nearby hotel having closed about 15 minutes before I got there. 

High Force

We saw surprisingly little wildlife during the couple of hours or so.  We thought there was a flock of fieldfares in some trees and there were three butterflies, one of which was a red admiral and a few buff-tailed bumblebee queens.  Birdwise there was the odd lapwing and curlew plus a few pied wagtails.

One surprise though was three completely white mallards that paddled their way across the Tees below Low Force.  Apparently this almost certainly means they were escapees as mallards held domestically are often bred to lose their natural colours.

We actually saw more birds while driving around the moors from place to place: partridge, a possible cuckoo, red grouse and short-eared owl.  And many skylarks.

A buff tailed bumblebee queen finally landed in my garden the other day.  So far they hadn't settled.

Queen Buff-tailed Bumblebee

Due to poor weather I hadn't been out on the bike for a long time apart from a couple of short refresher rides.  Again not much was seen but having got stopped at the level crossing at Wylam, I took a snap of the grey heron that frequently resides there.

Heron

Anyway, on Sunday I took advantage of what had been an excellent weather forecast for a ride up the coast to Cresswell and Druridge - except that the non-stop sunshine expected never happened and I was buffeted all day by a heavy onshore breeze that made me wish I'd taken my winter gloves!

On the Blyth estuary I got a couple of nice views of shelduck and redshank on the mudflats.

Shelduck

Redshank

I've always liked shelduck.

I did a detour around the Newbiggin area in search of Sandy Bay where rarities sometimes turn up - notably a bluethroat recently- but couldn't find it and made a quick exit to escape the Easter festivities.

At Cresswell and Druridge the most notable sighting was my first bar-tailed godwits, which turned up in both locations.  The one of Cresswell has spilled some weed on itself.

Bar-tailed godwit

I had hoped for avocets, which have recently appeared at both locations but unfortunately no luck and the spoonbill at Druridge didn't show either.  

Nevertheless there was a reasonable tally of further sightings recorded including a little egret in the corner at Cresswell, sanderling, lapwing, canada and greylag geese, shoveler, teal, wigeon, lapwing and several more shelduck

Lapwing

Shoveler

Unsurprisingly no butterflies were seen.

A Frantic Fortnight of Frustrating Photography

The Covid thing left me with an ongoing chestiness and I decided on a concerted activity campaign during last week's good weather involving several bike rides, tennis and walking cricket.

One of the many bike rides was to Prestwick Carr to see what was on the feeders and looking out for any activity en route, having seen a few peacock butterflies (about 6) and a few bumblebee queens on my other travels as well as hearing several chiffchaffs.

Not much turned up until I came to the end of the track out of Ponteland Park, when I was quite pleased to get a shot of a greenfinch up on a telegraph wire after several attempts.

Greenfinch

Both chiffchaffs and greenfinches have been turning up near the garden and hereabouts, usually heard rather than seen.

It was too early in the day for the short-eared owl at Prestwick Carr, but there was a single tree sparrow on the approach to the area and as usual several small birds near the feeders - notably reed buntings and willow tits as well as more greenfinches, other tits and the odd chaffinch.  Annoyingly, the sun was in such a position that it was impossible to focus on them without scaring them off and the best I could manage was a brief video of a willow tit in the hedgerow.

Willow Tit

There was another peacock and a small tortoiseshell, a large white (probable), a kestrel and a buzzard.

On Sunday, the last day of the really warm sunshine, Alex and I took a walk up to the the Gairs Viewpoint at RSPB Geltsdale in the hope we might see something interesting, which I said for me would be a grouse and either a peregrine or a merlin.

There were a few curlew near the car park.  Afterwards sightings tended once again to be fleeting but we continued well with a redpoll, a greenfinch and a stonechat as we advanced through the tree scrub, having seen a few lapwing in semi-display mode.

Once we reached the moorland, Alex spotted what appeared to be a merlin harassing some passing crows.  It looked like it had settled on a distant fencepost with a crow on another post nearby.  The trouble was that neither of the photos I took clearly showed a merlin so it was a bit of a conundrum.

Further on we started to hear grouse in the heather and a pair or red grouse flew right over our heads - naturally without posing for the camera.

On the way back more and more meadow pipits lifted off in front of us and more peacocks started to appear along with a single buff-tailed bumblebee.  A few buzzards were around and we spent some time working out that another distant bird on a wire was nothing more than a kestrel.  There was no sign of a peregrine.

In all of this the best photos I got were a robin and a stonechat!

Robin

Stonechat

Yesterday I took a quick walk in Chopwell Woods in the hope of seeing a few bumblebees.  One almost flew into me as I went out the door but there wasn't much doing in the Woods apart from another surprise small tortoiseshell at 10C.  As I turned for home more bumblebee queens did start to appear.  Several buff-tailed queens were not keen to settle and a suspected early bumblebee queen on some carnations and a possible garden bumblebee couldn't be confirmed.

Strangely the one butterfly that did linger was a lone tree bumblebee that looked a little small to be a queen but presumably was one.

Small Tortoiseshell

Tree Bumblebee

Sunday 2nd November

Bike ride over the Glenkiln route on Wednesday.  Not much birdlife but relaxed views of the changing tree colours looking back to Glenkiln in the low sunlight as I thought of the black swans that would probably be somewhere near the reservoir.

A lone juvenile buzzard was not inclined to shift from the low telegraph post as I rode right past him past Terregles, and up on the moors two red kites circled each other constantly.

Today on a spiritual trip to the impressive Samye Ling Tibetan Centre, a flight of swans over the Annan and at the Centre a bird picking its way through the gardens that ressembled a red grouse but was probably an ornamental species of some kind. Wish I'd checked its legs out more carefully to allow better comparison with internet images.

Autumn Scenery towards Glenkiln

Wednesday 4th March

Ambitious bike ride to Moniaive with Wednesday Wheelers at appropriately slow speed.  After spotting mad march hare on way out of Dumfries decided to see if I could beat the dozen bird species spotted on last ride and was surprised to notch up 20 on the way there alone.

Most productive stretch was the back road from the Cairn to Moniaive, producing male bullfinch and kestrel, which is now almost rare locally.  Also possible female grouse or red-legged partridge in stubble field that immediately hid before I could get a second look.

Much cooler in steady East wind.