An Autumn Day in East Yorkshire

October 16, 2021

I had a nice day out in East Yorkshire yesterday.

The morning dawned bright and I headed out to my favourite place-the Spurn peninsula.

Nothing too dramatic about the ride out although a skein of pink footed geese against the morning sunrise was a nice start.

I headed for the beach at Kilnsea to start with in the hope of some passage wildfowl or sea birds but there was very little on offer.

My next port of call was the Warren and apart from a few finches, again it was very quiet.

News of a snow bunting on the foreshore near the tank blocks crackled over the airwaves, so I headed for the canal banking. On the way I was fortunate enough to have a very brief encounter with a flock of 10 bearded tits before they took flight and headed south.

The snow bunting was typically oblivious to anyones presence so allowed for some nice photos in the early morning light.

It became apparent that there was not a lot about so I headed for the churchyard in the hope of getting a view of the recently arrived Western Bonelli’s Warbler. however it was not to be.

The Church Field can be good at this time of year and yesterday was no exception. Lesser redpolls feeding on seeds and joined by a brambling were a nice autumnal treat.

I had a drive up to Sammy’s Point but again it was very quite. A family of grey partridge were looking resplendent in the sunshine and a common buzzard sat briefly by the side of a dyke.

At around lunchtime, with news of a Western Bonelli’s Warbler at Flamborough, my resolve finally broke and I made my way north.

An hour and a half later I was watching a neat rarity from the Mediterranean (only my third ever-but strangely my second this week following very brief views of the one at Spurn on Tuesday).

It was on a circuit around the pines on a lovely south facing section of the footpath network around south landing. The combination of shelter from the wind and heat from the sun made for the most pleasant of viewing conditions.

Waders at the Wetlands

August 08, 2021

In the last week I have spent 3 sessions just in the hide at Kilnsea Wetlands and it has bee fantastic.

This time of year is always great for waders and this year it has been no exception (there’s still more to come) but when you have the added attraction of herons, gulls and terns, sometimes its difficult to know where to look.

Waders have included white-rumped sandpiper, curlew sandpiper, wood sandpier, common sandpiper, curlew, whimbrel, bar-tailed godwit, black-tailed godwit, lapwing, snipe, dunlin, ringed plover, little ringed plover, knot, redshank and greenshank.

There has been some fantastic performances by the three semi-resident spoonbills as well as a quite a showy great white egret, high counts of little egrets and the odd grey heron.

Gulls have included common, little, black-headed great black-backed, mediterranean and caspian and there has been a good number of sandwich terns, little terns and common terns.

Kilnsea Wetlands is one of those places that has its best times for viewing. Its always best over high tide and the bigger the tide the more birds there are as the water rising on the humber pushes the birds off and they relocate for a few hours on the wetlands. Big tides invariably occur either early morning or in the evening and if you get the timing right you could plan a visit that includes two high tides.

There has been the added distraction of birds of prey with marsh harrier, sparrowhawk, kestrel and peregrine falcon as well as a short-eared owl.

Mid-day and low tide is the wrong combination and would normally result in seeing the least activity, combined with the harsh mid-day light its best avoided.

All in all it is a truly magnificent place ant arguably at its peak at this time of year.

Summertime at Kilnsea Wetlands

July 18, 2021

Normally Kilnsea Wetlands are better known for the waders and wildfowl in Autumn and Winter but it is rapidly becoming an all year site. With yesterday’s fantastic numbers of Sandwich Terns along with 4 spoonbills, 1 great white egret little gulls common terns and the summer breeding little terns proving beyond doubt that there is some great birding to be had even in the traditionally quiet month of July.

I arrived at just after 6 and the sun was well up (sun rises are just too hard at this time of year!). The first thing I noticed since my last visit was the amount of noise-mainly from young Sandwich terns that had been brought by their parents from breeding grounds further north. At first the parents were bringing very small fish but as the sun rose (an potentially the temperature increased) they were bringing back large sandeels which no doubt made for a substantial meal. A quick scan on to Beacon Ponds had me viewing a distant great white egret which soon came very close and was not deterred by my presence one bit.

Back on to the wetlands and the little gull numbers were starting to build. These diminutive gulls are at their best in mid-summer with a sooty black head and bright red feet. As the end of the month approaches, their black heads get increasingly faded and disappear altogether as we get closer to autumn.

Another look on to Beacon Ponds produced the rather spectacular sight of around 40 little terns taking flight to see off a kestrel as to flew too close to the breeding area.

Someones dog was clearly out of control as it splashed around at the edge of the lagoon, perilously close to the breeding area-thankfully it appeared that no lasting harm was done.

One last look at Kilnsea Wetlands resulted in a nice fly-by from a pair of common terns and spoonbill numbers increased to 4 albeit they remained distant.

By 10am the sun was up, the heat was increasing as was the heat haze.

Time to go.

Another fantastic visit to the Uk’s premier wildlife watching site.