The Deskbound Birder: Penduline Tit

Showing posts with label Penduline Tit. Show all posts

Monday, 1 February 2016

Penduline Tit - Horsbere Flood Alleviation Pool, Brockworth, Gloucester 1st February

Sarah, Tobias and I were back at the cottage at Cowley for the weekend so I couldn't resist popping down to the Horsbere Flood Alleviation, only 15 minutes away, to see two male Penduline Tit that had been present since 11th January. These birds were the second record for Gloucestershire, the first being a single observer record of a female at Dyrham Park near Bath on 11th March 2015. The birds showed well today (although a little distant for the camera) but kept low in the Greater Reedmace and were not as showy as the Titchfield Haven birds that I had seen a couple of weeks ago. Much of their time was spent breaking open the stems of the Reedmace and, again, I saw them extracting small grubs that appeared to be beetle grubs. The birds were favouring the north-east corner of the pool but occasionally flew towards the Walls Building across the A417.

Sunday, 24 January 2016

Penduline Tit - Titchfield Haven 20th January

At last, fourth time lucky, I enter the West Hide at Titchfield Haven and there in front of me are four Penduline Tit, two males and two females. The birds were feeding on the heads of Greater Reedmace (these are not Bulrush as is being commonly claimed) pulling apart the downy clubbed seed heads of the plants for small insects and grubs - the second photograph shows a bird with what appears to be a small beetle grub. These birds have been present at Titchfield since 7th December, with a brief foray to the IBM Lake at Cobham, Portsmouth on 15th and 16th December before disappearing only to reappear at Titchfield again on 29th December. The IBM Lake is a little over 7 miles north-east of Titchfield Haven and it appears remarkable that the birds were firstly found at the lake but then decided to relocate back to Titchfield - seemingly a collective decision of birds that remembered that Titchfield Haven provided good conditions for them. Unfortunately, today in the bright sunshine of the early morning the light from the West Hide was not great so most of my shots are not of great quality, furthermore, none of the shots I took of the male birds are worthy of publication - a good reason to go back for more views!

Note the small grub in the bill of this bird

Tuesday, 27 January 2015

Extremadura - 19th January (Day 4 of 4)

The final day and up at 07:00 for a 07:30 breakfast, packed the bags and headed towards Embalse de Arrocampo in the dark. A short way from La Aldea del Obispo we passed over the Rio Marinejo and in the half light I spotted an Otter swimming upstream towards the road, we slammed on the breaks, turned and drove back but by the time we got back there was no sign, I wound down the window and heard the characteristic whistle of an Otter but we could not see it. We headed of to Arrocampo where a patchy fog hung over the ponds and wet fields. We first went to hide 2 and waited for the sun to rise, in the 45 minutes we spent here birds seen included Purple Gallinule, Bluethroat, Water Pipit and a heard only Penduline Tit. The view was quite spectacular with the snow covered Sierra de Gredos Mountains in the distance but rather unsightly factories and pylons in the foreground. We headed off to an area of fields and scattered Holm Oak where Black-winged Kite occurs but after 1.5 hours driving this area we had no luck, highlight was stunning views of a male Penduline Tit which showed down to 5m or so. Other birds here included Green Sandpiper and the usual field species such as Spotless Starling, Crested Lark, Corn Bunting, White Stork, Zitting Cisticola, Cattle Egret and Iberian (Southern) Grey Shrike. We decided to head for hide 5 where Bittern had recently been seen and Ricardo had also seen Black-winged Kite and as we approached the hide the in front of us hovering was a stunning Black-winged Kite, the bird hovered and then flew a wide circle around us before disappearing into the distance. A short watch at hide 5 produced the usual range of common wetland birds and then it was time to head for the airport. The final bird of the trip as we drove into Madrid was Monk Parakeet. I checked in for my 15:45 flight and relaxed in the airport lounge for a couple of hours and tallied the trip list, a total of 117 species and four lifers - Great Bustard, Spanish Imperial Eagle, Iberian Green Woodpecker and Iberian Azure-winged Magpie.