RSPB Minsmere – Friday 15th May 2015
Red-spotted Bluethroat
Garden Update: We are now seeing House Sparrow, Blackbird and Starling fledglings in the garden.
Starling Fledglings
RSPB Minsmere: When we left home at 9.25am it was overcast with a light breeze and the temperature was 11˚C. On the way our most notable sightings were 4 Kestrels, a Cuckoo and Mistletoe growing on a tree at Yoxford. By the evening the temperature had risen to 17˚C and the wind had freshened up a bit. On the way home there were a few spots of rain. We got home about 10pm by which time it was 13˚C.
When we have a special trip to places like Minsmere we try to book one of their mobility scooters in advance otherwise we’re very limited to where we can get to on the reserve. So our trip had been arranged earlier in the week. As the Warden was taking me through the controls of the scooter, which was a brand new one, only delivered the week before, she mentioned that a Red-spotted Bluethroat had been spotted and that we should head for that area first.
It was with some excitement that we left the visitor centre as neither of us had seen this particular bird. We’re not “Twitchers” but it’s always nice to see a bird for the first time, especially one as beautiful as this one. As we headed for the North Wall my heart sank when I saw the rugby scrum ahead of us. There were probably about 50 people strewn over the path, my first thought was to turn back as I felt quite vulnerable and self conscious on the scooter and from previous experience, we’ve found that people are not keen on them, but without it I couldn’t have even got this far.
We got to the crowd and as usual no one would let me through. My first thought was that I could sound the horn but if that scared the bird off I’d probably get lynched. So I asked Jan to walk in front of me and ask people to move. I had no choice but to go along to the path as both sides of it had steep slopes to the water. I said to Jan that we wouldn’t attempt to stop just to get the other side of the melee. Very reluctantly people moved so I could pass and eventually we got to the other side. I didn’t have any intention of stopping but as we cleared the crowd, the bird appeared right in front of us so we stopped and Jan took a picture and I rattled off a quick, short video. It was a bit like rough justice but it didn’t take long for the crowd to move towards us so we moved off quickly and headed down to the seashore which was as far as we could go with the scooter.
Looking Out To The North Sea
I was relieved to be clear of the crowd but couldn’t help but think we’ve got to go back through them to get back on to the main part of the reserve. Down at the sea front it was good to get my breath back and to breathe the sea air. We spent some time down there scanning the sea for Seals or Harbour Porpoise both of which are seen regularly there. We didn’t see any but we did see some beautiful Little Terns in flight there (our smallest sea bird).
Red Deer Hinds
It was so lovely to see the Swallows hawking for insects and the Common Terns fishing the bits of clear water. We also saw three Red Deer grazing in the Reed beds and even a couple of Bearded Tits and a family of Greylag Geese with goslings.
Just before we steeled ourselves for the return trip a man came over to us and asked what all the crowd was for, we told him and Jan showed him the picture she had taken. He said he would have a look. We met him again as we approached the scrum, he said he had seen the bird and pictures of it that some people had taken, but said none of them was as good as Jan’s picture.
Greylags & Goslings
I had rather hoped that the bird may have flown off and the crowd dispersed but there was little chance of that. About 50 yards from the crowd we had to move an unattended scope that was blocking the path but when we got to the crowd this time no one was going to move. It took us some time to get through this time. One person stepped back and nearly knocked me off the scooter and several times we came to a dead halt when people just wouldn’t move. If looks could have killed I would have died several times. Fortunately we got clear and I just couldn’t wait to put some distance between us and the “Twitchers.”
This is not the first time this has happened and not even the first time at Minsmere where a few years ago we were privileged to see a Wryneck but once again the “Twitchers” spoilt the whole experience. I was a bit more mobile then but still having to use crutches. Again there was a crowd of “Twitchers” there and they didn’t have the intelligence to see every time they moved closer to the bird it moved further away until it went out of sight. Eventually I spotted it it and told one of them to which he replied “You * muppet that’s a * Dunnock!” He did come back to me a bit later and apologised.
I can understand how the passion is stirred up with something you love but it shouldn’t allow the mob mentality to take over. It makes you wonder that if people behave like that when it is just a beautiful bird what would they behave like if it was something far more serious. I know the “Twitchers” would say there is nothing more serious than birding and as much as I enjoy it I wouldn’t dream of behaving like a hooligan.
Whitethroat
Anyway rant partially over. The good thing about a place like Minsmere is that it is so big and beautiful that it is easy to get lost in its magnificence so the experience with the “Twitchers” was soon forgotten in the beauty of the present moment.
We had another first when we saw a Small Copper, a small Butterfly that we’ve not seen before and we didn’t just see one we saw several.
Small Copper & Habitat
It was such a beautiful day and in a place like Minsmere the crowds soon disperse so there is a feeling of peace and solitude. We had a lovely picnic lunch in one of the hides (The North Hide – a double-decker hide). For me having the scooter enabled us to get to some parts of the reserve that we’ve not been to before, but unless you fly around with just a short stay in every hide you’d be hard pushed to cover the whole reserve in one day.
One of the highlights for me today was seeing a Great Crested Grebe with two chicks riding on her back as she swam around, I’ve longed to see that for quite a time, unfortunately the location of it wasn’t the most conducive for photography or video but we did manage to get some footage of it.
Other highlights were the Sand Martin Wall, the Bluebells in the woods, the view from the Tree Canopy Hide which is set 10 metres high among the tree-tops and hearing 2 Water Rails making their blood curdling calls to each other.
We had to make a dash to get back to the visitor centre to get the scooter back by 5pm but we just about made it. When we checked it in one of the Wardens was telling us that some of the “Twitchers” had been extremely rude and refused to show their membership cards. I have to say that the scooter was like the “Rolls-Royce” of mobility scooters, it was extremely comfortable and stable.
Caterpillars
After handing the scooter back we drove back towards the Island Hide where I managed to walk to the hide with frequent stops to get my breath back and to pause for a rest, it takes me so long to walk any distance. On the way to the hide we met a young lady who was an Artist recording the booming of Bitterns (which were frequent all day) to weave into a tapestry of sound (her words not mine). As it happened we had been trying something new this day.
We’ve long had a problem with the sound on our videos. Both our cameras are very noisy (most bridge cameras are) which has prevented us from using natural soundtracks. We have got round this in the past by deleting the audio and putting music on the videos but this rather loses the beauty of the moment. So today we tried using a sound recorder on the iPad to record some natural sounds of a couple of different areas of Minsmere to put on the videos to replace the mechanical sounds of the cameras. It seems to have worked so far but it is only in mono and not stereo, to get stereo we would have to spend quite a bit of money to get a dedicated sound recorder and I suspect that we would end up doing as much sound recording as videoing. We’ll see how it goes.
When we got to the hide there wasn’t much about except a couple of Marsh Harriers but in the hide there was another pet hate of mine, a self confessed expert lecturing someone at the other end of the hide on all aspects of his expertise. It was just too much and we were much too polite (or timid) to say anything so we left. Why can’t people just be quiet in hides?
A Selection Of Wild Flowers Seen
On the way back we were taught a salutary lesson to put us firmly in our places. At one of our many stopping places we were bemoaning the fact that people have been conditioned by these reserves to only “look” in the hides but rarely between them. We’d seen it a couple of times during the day. The expert and his audience had just passed us with his audience still receiving his lecture when all of a sudden there was whoosh directly over our heads. I, of course was looking in exactly the wrong direction and Jan said she was aware of a large bird gliding over us just above our heads. We’d heard Bitterns booming very close to where we were and in all likelihood this was one of them moving. That’ll teach us, but fortunately we had seen a Bittern earlier in the North Hide.
We made one last excursion to somewhere I’ve always wanted to go to and that was the Tree-top Canopy Hide but although the view was tremendous it was really the wrong time of day but we did hear a couple of Tawny Owls calling until somebody parked in the vicinity of the hide (it isn’t far from the road) and had their stereo blasting away!
It had been a very good day a part from the obvious blotches.
What we Saw:
5 Kestrels
1 Cuckoo (1 seen but several others heard during the day)
1 Bittern (seen but others heard booming during the day & odd close experience)
3 Marsh Harriers
Red-spotted Bluethroat
Bearded Tit**
Whitethroat (1 seen but several others heard)
3 Blackcap (2 males 1 female but others heard)
Common Tern**
Little Tern**
Great Crested Grebe* (1 pair with 2 chicks)
Lapwing*
Oystercatcher*
Dunnock
2 Wren
Dunlin**
Knot
Ringed Plover
Common Sandpiper
Redshank**
Golden Plover**
2 Heron
Chiffchaff
Water Rail (heard 2)
Tawny Owl (heard)
Mistle Thrush
Greylag Geese & goslings**
Canada Geese & goslings**
Barnacle Geese & goslings**
Gadwall & ducklings**
Mallard* (Cormorant2 with chicks)
Pr Tufted Duck
Pr Shoveler
Little Egret**
Black Tailed Godwit*
Avocets*
Black-headed Gull*
1 Common Gull
1 Kittiwake
2 Lesser Black-backed Gulls
Herring Gulls*
Swallows*
House Martins**
Sand Martins*
Swifts*
Shelduck**
Coot**
Moorhen**
Blackbird*
Blue Tit*
Great Tit*
Chaffinch*
Reed Bunting
Reed Warbler (heard several)
Sedge Warbler (heard)
Corvids* (Crows, Rooks, Jackdaws & Magpies)
Wood Pigeons*
4 Mute Swans
3 Red Deer hinds
Rabbits*
Peacock Butterfly**
Small Copper Butterfly**
Small White Butterfly
Caterpillars (As yet unidentified)
Red Soldier Beetle
Wolf Spider
* = Too many to count
** = Several
Springwatch - Nearly Open For Business
Keep your eyes peeled and good spotting.
When we have a special trip to places like Minsmere we try to book one of their mobility scooters in advance otherwise we’re very limited to where we can get to on the reserve. So our trip had been arranged earlier in the week. As the Warden was taking me through the controls of the scooter, which was a brand new one, only delivered the week before, she mentioned that a Red-spotted Bluethroat had been spotted and that we should head for that area first.
It was with some excitement that we left the visitor centre as neither of us had seen this particular bird. We’re not “Twitchers” but it’s always nice to see a bird for the first time, especially one as beautiful as this one. As we headed for the North Wall my heart sank when I saw the rugby scrum ahead of us. There were probably about 50 people strewn over the path, my first thought was to turn back as I felt quite vulnerable and self conscious on the scooter and from previous experience, we’ve found that people are not keen on them, but without it I couldn’t have even got this far.
I had rather hoped that the bird may have flown off and the crowd dispersed but there was little chance of that. About 50 yards from the crowd we had to move an unattended scope that was blocking the path but when we got to the crowd this time no one was going to move. It took us some time to get through this time. One person stepped back and nearly knocked me off the scooter and several times we came to a dead halt when people just wouldn’t move. If looks could have killed I would have died several times. Fortunately we got clear and I just couldn’t wait to put some distance between us and the “Twitchers.”
One of the highlights for me today was seeing a Great Crested Grebe with two chicks riding on her back as she swam around, I’ve longed to see that for quite a time, unfortunately the location of it wasn’t the most conducive for photography or video but we did manage to get some footage of it.
After handing the scooter back we drove back towards the Island Hide where I managed to walk to the hide with frequent stops to get my breath back and to pause for a rest, it takes me so long to walk any distance. On the way to the hide we met a young lady who was an Artist recording the booming of Bitterns (which were frequent all day) to weave into a tapestry of sound (her words not mine). As it happened we had been trying something new this day.
When we got to the hide there wasn’t much about except a couple of Marsh Harriers but in the hide there was another pet hate of mine, a self confessed expert lecturing someone at the other end of the hide on all aspects of his expertise. It was just too much and we were much too polite (or timid) to say anything so we left. Why can’t people just be quiet in hides?
On the way back we were taught a salutary lesson to put us firmly in our places. At one of our many stopping places we were bemoaning the fact that people have been conditioned by these reserves to only “look” in the hides but rarely between them. We’d seen it a couple of times during the day. The expert and his audience had just passed us with his audience still receiving his lecture when all of a sudden there was whoosh directly over our heads. I, of course was looking in exactly the wrong direction and Jan said she was aware of a large bird gliding over us just above our heads. We’d heard Bitterns booming very close to where we were and in all likelihood this was one of them moving. That’ll teach us, but fortunately we had seen a Bittern earlier in the North Hide.
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