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RIBBLE ESTUARY BAIKAL TEAL

Baikal Teal, with Eurasian Wigeon, on Crossens Marsh at the mouth of the Ribble Estuary

THE BAIKAL TEAL AT CROSSENS OUTER MARSH IS CAUSING A LOT OF EXCITEMENT at the moment and thanks to the previous British records there will not be much debate about its origin. It is associating with the thousands of Eurasian Wigeon in the Marshside area at the moment and looks 'wild' enough for now. We said 'as long as it does not stay until June and start begging for bread!'. It has an odd face pattern with a white vertical stripe on the face but this is apparently within the known range for this bird. Also here were: Great Egret (one miles away on Banks Marsh); Little Egrets that no-one raises their binos to; small numbers of Ruff, Black-tailed Godwits; hundreds of golden plovers and lapwings and a peregrine that spread panic amongst the flocks as it zoomed across Marshside. The Long-tailed Duck had returned to the Junction Pool as the heavens opened and the rest of the afternoon was washed away by rain. I hardly ever mention football scores but Cabaye's goal that sunk Manchester United this afternoon and gave Newcastle United their first win at Old Trafford for 41 years was very special indeed!

Long-tailed Duck usually turns up in late autumn in Lancashire

Storm clouds over Southport

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PENDLE CALLING!

Pendle Hill above a sea of mist in the Ribble Valley on Thursday had me looking forward to the weekend

A CLASSIC MORNING ON PENDLE STARTED WITH A BUZZARD over the rough pasture at the foot of the big end at dawn. A pair of ravens over the Downham scree slope was quickly followed by a fine Peregrine Falcon fly past. Eventually Martin and I managed to find the Snow Bunting flock by the path at the top of the slope just north of Hookcliffe Plantation. Our attention was drawn to them by a scattering of tiny droppings and not far away two birds popped into view feeding in the long grass, followed by another. Sadly they quickly took flight, towering above us to reveal a total of 14 birds this time, the highest count of the autumn so far. Also on Pendle today were four European Golden Plovers and around 15 Red Grouse. This is about as good a day as can be realistically expected on Pendle in winter, barring something really special. I live in hope and Martin described how he found one of Pendle's three Shore (= Horned) Larks amongst a flock of Snow Buntings on the Downham scree slope. Now that is something!

A fell runner reaches Pendle summit the hard way, straight up the Pendleside slope.

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PENDLE HILL SNOW BUNTINGS

A gorgeous male Snow Bunting on lookout on Pendle Hill

SUCH BEAUTIFUL BIRDS KEEP ME GOING UP PENDLE. The small winter fllock of Snow Buntings can be tricky to pin down on the summit as they range widely over the cold and steep Downham scree slope on the northwest side of the big end, anywhere between the spring and the second stile. Mark Varley, Martin Naylor and I eventually built up to nine birds on a clear and bright morning today, starting with ones and twos and then a foursome that was ultimately joined by another five. There has been a small flock of Snow Buntings on Pendle each winter in recent years but numbers are now a far cry from the peak of 80 in December 2003. Just like the declining dotterel, I wonder for how long they will continue to visit Pendle? We also heard what was almost certainly yesterday's Lapland Bunting overhead but against the sun. We eventually ran out of energy and enthusiasm having seen last autumn's obliging bird so nicely and abandoned our search for it. The views from Pendle were also nice, with a snow-capped Snowdon in north Wales clearly visible, although behind a wall of wind turbines. Other birds on Pendle included three European Golden Plovers, one Meadow Pipit and around 10 Red Grouse, now marking their territories ready for next spring. 

Mark Varley on a very bleak Pendle Hill

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TEXAS WHOOPING CRANES

A pair of Whooping Cranes fresh from Wood Buffalo in Canada with their new addition!

ONE OF THE WORLD'S TOP 100 BIRDING EXPERIENCES WITHOUT A DOUBT is a visit to Aransas NWR in South Texas. It has been on my 'to do' list for a long time and after this year's RGV birding festival I finally got around to it. With such conspicuous birds it is more a case of how close the birds are rather than whether or not you are going to see them and the classic way to do this is via a Whooping Crane Tours boat trip out of Rockport on Captain Tommy Moore's 'Skimmer'. The boat trip was very enjoyable, happily on a still and sunny day, it was even quite warm at times out on the water. Captain Tommy is great fun, very knowledgeable and tries hard to point out as many birds as possible, not just the cranes and we saw a good variety of waterbirds including most of the herons and egrets and several shorebirds, including plenty of (Western) willets. Kevin Karlson told me recently that research has suggested that all Eastern Willets spend the winter outside the USA so all east coast birds in winter are likely to be Westerns. A total of around 50 species included a Peregrine sheltering under the heron nesting platforms in Carlos Bay and a pair of Hooded Mergansers on a small pool near Sundown Bay.

Whooping Crane with a blue crab - the mainstay of its winter diet

It is the cranes that are everyone's main desire on the boat trips and, whilst interesting, other birds are incidental for most folks aboard. Being 1.5 metre tall they can be seen from a vast distance and are easily identified from the many Great Egrets by their usually horizontal backs. We were lucky that there were a couple of family groups fairly close to the main shipping channel, otherwise our views could have been much more distant. The coastal landscape here is truly massive and it is very easy to underestimate the size of the vast bays enclosed by the barrier islands... until you check the scale of the map. One of the pairs was also calling to each other, apparently a warning call referring to us so we did not pause here too long. There are not too many birds down to three figures in North America and it was a special privilege to spend some time with the Whooping Cranes.

Captain Tommy Moore on board 'Skimmer'

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