Dirty little 'Twitcher'...

Got dragged kicking and screaming to Lerwick today for my wife to go shopping!....... shopping...... BLOODY SHOPPING!!! She has obviously forgotten it's October, with Easterly winds, and anything can and will turn up in Shetland at this time of year. So as punishment for this 'crime', I decided to drag her off to twitch a few of the goodies that were hanging on doon Sooth.

First up was the Pallas's Warbler at Sumburgh Farm. A great little bird found hopping along a stone wall. While photographing this wee gem, I also heard a Richard's Pipit fly over! It was only 5 min later that I spotted it landing in the next field and managed a distant view of it sitting in the grass, before taking off again and flew North over the Hotel while calling all the time.... Nice!

Pallas's Warbler;

As my wife didn't seem too pissed off at this outing. Next up was the Dusky Warbler at Quendale. This bird was a total pain in the arse as it only showed on the deck for a few seconds, but it did call, and it did fly a lot.... a hell of a lot! No pics of the Dusky, as it just wouldn't cooperate, but the Red-breasted Fly at the rifle range did pose...

RB Fly;

Goldcrest looking cute!

Dunlin with a very long bill;

The one that got away?... On leaving Quendale I had brief views of a Tree Pipit which landed on the path for a couple of seconds before flying off into the bushes. Only a couple of hours later a Olive-backed Pipit was reported at the same place! On 'my' quick views it did just look like a Tree Pipit to me, with not enough colour in the mantle, but a good strong head pattern. Oh well, shit happens....

Two Peregrine were also good to see today. One carrying prey at Sumburgh Airport, and the other at Dales Voe being mobbed by the local 'Hoodies'

Look into my eyes...

Nothing rare today, though 'another' Barred Warbler and the Jack Snipe at Littlester, wasn't too bad a way to start the day! The 'best of the rest', were made up of; Lesser Whitethroat (patch year tick!), Whinchat, Bramblings, Chaffinches, Garden Warbler, Chiffchaff and loads of Goldcrests...

The Jack Snipe can be very confiding, but it can take quite a lot to find him in this large area!

What do you mean I'm not invisible! and looking a bit more relaxed

A very uncooperative Lesser Whitethroat; Male Brambling 'posing'

Lancy...

With a few good birds about Shetland yesterday, I decided to head to the top of Yell, and see what was being missed up there. Only while driving there I received a text from Rob Brooks to ask if I was planning a visit to the Lanceolated Warler on Unst..... decision time!...... In the end I cracked and gave up and headed to Unst. The thought of a Lancy on the neighbouring island, was just too much for me to ignore! And what a wee stunner it was too. In complete contrast to the other 'locustella' warblers being found on Shetland this Autumn, this bird was happy doing it's stuff as we all watched a few meters away! I didn't want to hang around too long, as I knew lots of folk would be heading for this bird, so I only hung about for 15 min or so, and went back to birding Yell. Many thanks to Rob, Tim and Martin for this cracking bird...

'corax' karaoke?

Recorded this Raven on Yell today. Now the unusual thing about this bird, is the fact he seems to be trying to do the corvid version of karaoke. All the clicks etc are coming from the same bird!



Apart from vocal corvids. Today had me checking various areas, and produced; 1 Yellow-browed Warbler, 18 Barnacle Geese, 1 Pied Flycatcher and lots of Siskin, Brambling, Chaffinch, Blackcaps etc... Not too bad, but there must be a good 'Yank' out there somewhere!

Birds on film...

To a complete technophobe like myself, doing simple things like downloading a short video clip of the Unst Turtle Dove from the end of Sept, can take quite a while... It was filmed on my mobile from the car! so quality not great... (A few folk thought that the bird looked a bit 'unhealthy' from the pics I took, so this is just to show how active it really was!)

It's all gone a bit 'Brown'

If ever there was a theme to today's birding, this title sums it up quite nicely!

The plan was for a birding raid on the mainland with Jase, to catch up with the reported 'PG Tips' at Levenwick, then perhaps mop up the other good birds that had been hanging around...

As we all know, plans never go to plan. So after a few hours of chasing the bird equivalent of a 'feathered' missile around a patch of Irises. The reported 'PG Tips' turned into a 'Gropper'. (it was a hard call though, and full marks to the lads for even finding it in the first place)

Not one of my best photos, but you can see all the identification features of a lump of shit about to hit a fan!

From there to the Farm at Sumburgh, where we were told the Radde's was showing beautifully. Which it duly did for us as well. In complete contrast to the above bird. (still a wee brown job though!)After that, it was decided to visit the Channerwick Booted/Sykes's. The bird did to show perched-up for all of about 2 seconds in the next 2 hours! It too was screaming about like a bird possessed in the windy conditions. (so no pics of this one either)

We decided the long staying Buff-bellied Pipit at Eshaness had to be showing better than these. So we took the long drive North, where after a few false starts with flighty pipits in horrendous light conditions, we finally locked onto the right bird. This bird was a total gem, and showed very well as we watched it from the car!

To finish off the 'Brown' theme, we then visited the 2 Buff-breasted Sandpipers at the lighthouse, which performed fantastic as they usually do (why can't British waders be as tame as these?). We also had a c100+ Snow Bunting passing through on arrival, but they didn't hang about long...

Buff...

These two Buff-breasted Sandpipers were showing well at Eshaness, so it only seemed polite to pay them a visit, and a small flock of c12 Snow Buntings there made it all the nicer too!

and I've no idea what that 'blob' is that it's eating? but it looks disgusting!