Steve's Birding,Wildlife & Walking Blog: Super Spurn,Sunday 28th August 2016.

Thursday 1 September 2016

Super Spurn,Sunday 28th August 2016.

With the possibility of a migrant arrival after the heavy rain and easterly element in the wind overnight on Saturday i decided to head for that fantastic spit of land at the mouth of the Humber Estuary.
The travel over was fairly quiet apart from a Tawny Owl flying across the road infront of me at Thorngumbald.
I eventually arrived at the Bluebell car park and had a drink and something to eat before heading off.
I decided to walk the Triangle first,looking in Corner Field to begin with,but nothing apart from a small flock of juvvie Goldfinches and a couple of Whitethroats.Overhead very little looked to be moving,apart from a local flock of Swallows and House Martins and an adult Med Gull passed over towards the sea.
The road up to Cliff Farm and Kilnsea Churchyard was very quiet and i thought to myself today is going to be hard going migrant wise.
The walk along Canal Bank was equally quiet,with highlights only including singles of Redstart and Whinchat and a Greenshank 'Tu Tu Tu'd' along the Humber shore.
A look from Canal Scrape hide revealed a single Pied Flycatcher in the hawthorns at the back of the scrape and single eclipse drake Wigeon and a juv Little Grebe quietly went about their business of getting some breakfast on the scrape itself.
A message came over the radio that a Barred Warbler had been seen from Canal Bank were i had walked,so i gave it a half hearted attempt at trying to see it,but just couldn't be bothered to be honest.
I walked up to the Warren and then continued along the shore back to the Blue Bell.
By this time i was ready for something else to scoff,so had the rest of my pack up and shed some clothing as it was fairly pleasant now after the cool start and decided to head up Beacon Lane and cover the Wetlands area.To be fair this was the best move of the day and was pretty productive.
Highlights included a Juv Little Stint on Holderness Field which commuted between here and the Wetlands,briefly being joined by another on the Wetlands later,which then flew onto the Humber,a Juv Curlew Sandpiper which commuted also between the Wetlands and Holderness Field,the resident Juv Wood Sandpiper on the Wetlands,2 Juv Little-ringed Plover on the Wetlands,2 Greenshank and a handfull of Med Gulls also on the Wetlands.
The Juvenile Wood Sandpiper showed impeccably and i managed to obtain some nice shots of it as it fed at fairly close range infront of the hide.
After enjoying the waders and gulls etc on the Wetlands a message came over the radio that a Wood Warbler had been found in Easington Churchyard,so off i went for a look.A small crowd had gathered and it wasn't long before i saw this silky plumaged Phyllosc shoot between the trees it was feeding in and this is how it continued with the little buggar not showing at all well,but at least i had seen it.
After all this excitement i decided to end the day on a more relaxed note, looking at the gulls along Easington Straight.After a botched attempt at making a juvenile Lesser black-Back into the earlier reported juv Caspian Gull,i decided to look at the much prettier Med Gulls on show,which included at least 28 individuals while i was present.I know these days people take this species for granted,but i really like them and there are a few sites around the country were they seem to gather in good numbers,this being one of them.
So after 10 hours in the field i decided to call it a day and head home back to North Linc's after another visit to this superb birding area.