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Sunday, 9 February 2025

Red-breasted Merganser at Ormesby

Perseverance pays off! With all my 'meteorite jobs' taken care of (after a 5.00am start!) and with Linda busy making beeswax products, I decided on another bash at the female or juvenile Merganser at Ormesby. The weather (while still decidedly wintry) was better than yesterday and I quickly located the colourful sawbill to the north of the A149 bridge. (Several drake Goldeneye still, too)

Mission accomplished I headed on to Yarmouth, spending half an hour in a futile search for Black Redstarts, returning home via Halvergate, where four Cattle Egrets were still present.














Last ever Collier Row Gem & Mineral Show

Spacerocks UK (the meteorite dealership that Linda and I run) is closing in May: we're retiring after nearly 30 years. Now in our seventies, the long drives, hotel beds and increasing competition, means that our attendance at the Essex Gem & Mineral Show will be our very last at the venue. We have thoroughly enjoyed 'stalling out' since 2010, and will miss the knowledgeable dealers, friendly organisers and, of course, the fried egg sandwiches!

Saturday, 8 February 2025

Elusive Merganser

Linda had the car this morning, so I had to wait until gone 2.00pm to whizz out to Ormesby Broad for a quick search for the female / juvenile Red-breasted Merganser that's been reported for a couple of days.
Unfortunately (despite a thorough search) I couldn't find the elusive sawbill: just a few Goldeneye, a couple of Red Kites and a flock of roosting Cormorants.







Friday, 7 February 2025

Beautiful first quarter Moon

Always beautiful at this phase, with terrific mountain ranges and crater fields....





Thursday, 6 February 2025

Rationalising my life list: and the ones that got away...

Like many birders, I keep several bird lists: UK life list, Norfolk list, birds I've photographed and year lists. I've seen over 300 birds in a calendar year on three occasions (all of which included a Scillonian Pelagic) photographed 342 species and recorded 358 in Norfolk.

Every now and then the BBRC carries out a few lumps or splits, both of which affect the totals: this year it's said we're going to 'lose' some Redpolls, Green-winged Teal, Hooded Crow and other species that currently occur on my list!

With this in mind I dug out my old 'pre-electronic' bird logs and had a count up: it seems my 'revised list' is now 434 species. I sort of stopped twitching at 400, so the extras have been birds such as Lammergeier that I made a special effort to see. While looking through the log for 1987, I came across the only truly mega species I found all by myself. The key phrase is 'by myself': despite phoning every birder I knew from the paybox at Horsey, no-one managed to arrive before dark...

The painting is of what was possibly the best day I ever enjoyed in Norfolk. Will we ever see another like it?





Tuesday, 4 February 2025

Glaucous Gull, Lesser Whitefronts and much more!

My turn to drive, so I decided to visit the north west of the county, starting at Snettisham. Following a brisk walk north along the raised bank we luckily bumped into a couple of birders who'd pinned down the Lesser White-fronted geese about a mile away through a gap in the intervening hedges. Although distant, the birds were surprisingly obvious among the larger Greylags.

Next stop was Holme: parking by the golf course, we walked out to the beach and headed west. Soon we picked up a flock of very approachable Snow Buntings, before locating the target bird - a juvenile Glaucous Gull. On the way back to the car we found a group of 4 or 5 Shorelarks and - I think - several Lapland Buntings. First Fulmar of the year drifted west...

Last stop was Thornham Harbour: hundreds of Brents flighted in ahead from the rising tide, but I reckon I found the reported Black Brant. Coffee and scones at Cley (and a great chat with a couple of visiting birders from Sussex and Devon) failed to reveal any odd men out among the Scoters.



















Monday, 3 February 2025

The Old Moon in the New Moon's arms!

Yesterday's beautiful conjunction between the Moon and Venus ended as they drifted apart: the Moon continues its trip along the ecliptic, visiting Uranus on the 5th, Jupiter on the 6th and Mars on the 9th.
Sunlight reflected from the Earth lit up the unilluminated regions of the Moon, creating the lovely effect in today's title.



Sunday, 2 February 2025

A spectacular sight in the night sky...

Last night old friends Penny and Paul invited us to dinner (which was - predictably - excellent) necessitating a frosty drive to Acle. The sky was spectacularly clear, being dominated by a close conjunction of the crescent Moon, Venus and Saturn: to the east Jupiter and Mars were just as impressive...





Friday, 31 January 2025

A Short-eared Owl closer to home - and a year tick!

Birding chum Brian Tubby sent me a terrific photo of a Short-eared Owl he'd taken at a traditional spot at Halvergate: this was all the excuse Linda and I needed to pop down for an hour after lunch. We were quite surprised that there were no Cattle Egrets - just a solitary Little Egret - but I was pleased to add White-fronted Goose to the year list, lurking among the squillions of Pinkfeet! (I had hoped to reach 100 by the end of January - so near, yet so far!)

We did see a Shortie, but it was distant and flighty, so I've used Brian's amazing photo instead!








Back to College! Prof. Bridget Wade at UEA

Friends Peter and Sue invited me to a lecture at UEA about the effects on global climate of two 'asteroidal' impacts around 35,000,000 years ago. The presenter was the delightful Prof. Bridget Wade from UCL, who succeeded in delivering a fairly obscure piece of research in a lively and interesting way. Amusingly, her conclusion was that there was no evidence of any sustained climate change following the Popigai and Chesapeake impacts! (Naturally, I couldn't resist making a contribution from a meteoritist's perspective!)







Thursday, 30 January 2025

Hemblington Church bird survey

While we were away last weekend, Peter and Sue oversaw the annual RSPB bird count at the church. Unfortunately the weather was pretty bad and not many birds were seen. Today Linda and I were much luckier, both with the birds and weather! Green Woodpecker and Song Thrush might, I think, be new for the churchyard... Great to see the 'Friends of the Church' have, with the help of the farmer, erected a Barn Owl box.