The Lincolnshire Bird Club

Instead of giving daily updates I'll try and pop the all sightings throughout the month into one topic. This will make it easier to get a feel for what's about and hopefully others can add to it. Will get the ball rolling with this weeks sightings and two of our recent daily sightings maps which we put out on Twitter. Here is Saturday the 22nd and Sunday the 23rd

Hope they're of use. May be the first time some of you have seen the map so if you have any thoughts or would like a copy to get your bearings then please let me know.

If you are visiting this week then head up to North Scrape as that's where most of the waders are. There will be some topping of the grassland with the tractor this week so birds may get pushed to the scrapes. We will be looking to top Roads Farm grassland asap to make sure we're ready for the weekend as it's going to be pretty special....

T

At Tabs Head today were Pied Fly Spot Fly, Hobby, 5 Lesser Whitethroat and 25 Willow Warblers (thanks to Paul Sullivan for the sightings) and here is today's sightings map.

Today's highlight was a juvenile Black Tern that mooched about South Scrape for a few hours before heading high and south. The rest of the days best bits can be seen here

Not as much a report as a prediction for reports. Big tides this weekend so get down to either of our reserves. More details about times and where to go when here.

A quick query as well if I may.... I posted the above blog and high tide details on the 'General Lincs Birding' thread (as it's not technically a sighting) but less than 40 people have viewed it. Does no-one use or look at that page much? Am I better off putting bits of interest on here, ie any management we are doing, as more people view this thread or should I stick to the other thread and hope people pick it up?

Yesterday's sightings map. Check tides for tonight and next few days. If you don't get to Frampton then hit Gib or regular roost spots up the Humber. It's a dusk one this evening which may just nudge beyond sunset but Freiston is the place to be. It's at 20:20 so get there for 7-ish and enjoy the build up. Big BIG tide tomorrow at 08:25 and after that we're mornings only as it will be dark in the evening.

Black-eared Wheatear reported today at Frampton. Original observer saw dark throated wheatear with clear demarcation between throat and chest which immediately raised suspicions. He saw it near East Hide from the 360 hide but by the time he got round there the bird had got pretty wet and the plumage details on the underside were hard to see, which is illustrated by these two photographs.

Another observer described the bird thus 'I had it down to 10 foot with a Northern Wheatear and it wasn't a Northern. Yes it was soaked, but had white all the way up its back, was slighter, longer legged and had a thinner beak than Northern. We were all baffled and bemused by this bird, never once did it look like a Northern, no one put it down to species either

I did get to see it but it was doing very little and sat still for 80% of the time. When it did move it was noticeably darker as the pictures show, but so drenched that all plumage features were impossible to pick out. When it did fly well enough to see the tail (once, briefly at distance, I thought I saw the white cutting into the black bar on the tail. Not much but a little. Some observers thought they saw black up the sides of the tail while others didn't. An educational bird but unfortunately one that has't had a definite id put on it, not by me at least. I am leaning towards Northern on the brief views I got but appreciate the bird looks very different to when others saw it.

Was down at Freiston this evening for the high tide. All of the salt marsh was covered with 95% of the realignment under water. The tide tomorrow is 40 cm higher so could be no vegetation visible at all. Good numbers of birds at Freiston though too dark to grill the calidrids. Rough figures are 2k Oystercatcher, 800 Redshank, 500 Knot, 300 Dunlin, 150 Turnstone, 100 Grey Plover, 20 Greenshank, 6 Common Sandpipers and then handfuls of BlackWit, Curlew, Whimbrel and Ringed Plover. Quite a few birds headed towards the reservoir so overall numbers would be higher. 2 Short-eared Owls were hunting over the breaches and there were at least 5 Sandwich and a possible (distant and dark) Black Tern on posts out in The Wash.

Couple more sightings maps from the weekend. August 29th and August 30th Hope those that haven't seen them before are finding them useful, both for sightings and to learn the names of places. Not had any comments on here as yet but lots of positive feedback on the reserve and on social media. We are looking to put a sightings board up in a similar design outside the VC so those that come out of hours can not only see what's been see that day but also record what they have seen out of hours after we close and before we open. Reminder about the tide tomorrow.... Be at Frampton or Freiston for 7am to get the best out of the morning.