November 7 2010

Having done nothing for two days of my four day long weekend due to having a dose of man flu, a chance to get out today was taken. Alan and I headed for Commondale in North Yorkshire in the hope of a Rough-legged Buzzard or four. Once on site loads of birders were around but no buzzards had been seen, so we drove up Kildale Moor and set off on a walk towards Sledale. Plenty of Red Grouse, some of which are very approachable, but still no buzzards.
 
As we were walking along the track a pipit flushed from the side of the path, flew about twenty yards and landed out of sight, but the brief view set alarm bells ringing, something was different about the bird. We now approach where it landed with a bit of caution, only for it to flush again, this time it called “shreep”, a large pipit that called like a House Sparrow; Richard’s Pipit. We alert a couple of birders just ahead of us and we track it down again and this time I get a brief snatch of call on the recorder, its by no means brilliant, but have a listen. You hear a Meadow pipit call and then what sounds like a sparrow, that’s the bird…


...further up the valley it shows well on the ground before flying off over the valley and out of sight. While here a buzzard is found, which turns out to be a Common.
We head back to road where all of the birders are parked, to hear that we have missed a Rough-legged Buzzard by ten minutes as it flew over the valley. About 30 minutes later the shout goes up “here they are two of them” , well, no, not even one! Bird one was a Common Buzzard and bird two wasn’t even a buzzard, its a ringtail Hen Harrier. Enough was the cry, time to leave, I’ve had enough…
And then in the car on the way back, we receive news of a county tick; Cetti’s Warbler at Chevington, no chance of getting there before dark, it’ll have to wait till Wednesday for it to see me!