it is claimed that ageing and sexing these things in autumn if almost impossible but this bird seems to have some good juvenile features eg the pale whitish tips to the extreme tips of the tertials, sharply pointed secondaries and primaries, a moult contrast in the greater coverts with inners pale tipped although the latter feature is not as obvious as on some birds photographed; then it also seems to have some good male features like the developing whitish supercilia, the very bright tail and rump and the suggestion of blue in the lesser and median coverts; not sure if the very obvious white eye ring is of any significance but it is much more obvious than some autumn birds -- so I would suggest that it is a first-winter male but I stand to be corrected --
for anyone without the gen here are the previous records --note that the North Cotes bird was the first for Britain
2002 Gibraltar Point, female or first-winter, 15th to 16th November, photo. Birding World 15 (11): 452, photos; Birding World 15 (12): 517, photo; M. J. Rogers and the Rarities Committee, British Birds 96: 587
1999 Skegness, female or first-winter, 22nd to 23rd October, photo. Birding World 12 (10): 391, photo; British Birds 93: plate 279; M. J. Rogers and the Rarities Committee, British Birds 94: 486
1988 Theddlethorpe Dunes, female or first-winter, trapped, 12th October, photo. M. J. Rogers and the Rarities Committee, British Birds 82: 540, plates 333-334
1978 Donna Nook, first-winter female, 10th October. M. J. Rogers and the Rarities Committee, British Birds 72: 533
1903 North Cotes, adult male, seen, 21st September. G. H. Caton Haigh, Zoologist 1904: 293; Eds., British Birds 47: 28-30; Smith & Cornwallis, 1955; P. A. D. Hollom, British Birds 49: 359; Lorand & Atkin, 1989
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