Patch geese

The reality of urban birding - rare grey geese about to be flushed by a dog!

It's been quite a while since my last blog post. Despite saying that I would be writing about an exciting autumn of migration, I ended up burning myself out so badly that I had basically vowed to take some time away from the hobby at least in the context of trying to find my own rare birds. I had a big trip to South Africa planned for 18th November to 10th December and I decided to focus on that rather than occupy myself with any more thoughts of rarities, twitching and British birding in general.

There are a few reasons for this - partly because despite touring several coastal hotspots this autumn I didn't find anything of note, a situation exacerbated by the continued discovery of rare birds back in Oxfordshire; hence, there was a feeling of not being rewarded for my time and therefore failing to get much enjoyment out of it. In hindsight, this probably wasn't quite true, and I still had a few fantastic experiences (e.g. being at the Wirral on a big Leach's Petrel day). Unfortunately it really gets to me when others continue to find rare birds when I perceive myself to be putting in an equal/more substantial effort - I have a hard time telling myself that the main determinant is just luck.

Leach's Petrel at Leasowe

In addition, I didn't enjoy my ringing trip to Cornwall for various reasons and therefore was put off writing about it. Perhaps that's a story for later. Another week on Portland resulted only in finding a second Grey Phalarope and a Woodlark whilst unfortunately missing a flyover Richard's Pipit (which in my already jaded state was quite the blow). The trip was just about saved by twitching a Pallas' Warbler, but overall I left with very little enthusiasm remaining for British birding. The only other birding I did before going to South Africa was twitching Pallid Swifts and Dusky Warbler in Kent.

Two Pallid Swifts at North Foreness

So that brings us to South Africa, which will be the subject of a separate set of blog posts. Needless to say the trip was very successful - amazing country, wildlife and experience more generally. I'm not sure that I've been converted to the idea of primarily doing this hobby from a world birding perspective, but seeing 469 species in the space of just three weeks was incredible. Many of these were endemics and visually spectacular. It felt very weird not knowing how to identify a large proportion of the birds whilst still being pretty adept at spotting/hearing them, and moving around the country so much meant that there was a continued flow of new species to learn. A sneak preview here of two of my favourite photos from the trip - a chance for some proper bird photography rather than just aiming at specks and hoping for the best like I usually do. The first blog post to come will be an overview of the itinerary and logistics and I think the rest of the trip divides quite nicely into five further posts.

Southern Yellow-billed Hornbill

Chorister Robin-chat

Since getting back I hadn't done any birding and I resolved to keep it that way at least until the New Year. I'm currently staying in London and don't really have a patch here, so even if I hadn't already decided to lay off the birding for a bit there would have been little temptation to get out anyway. However, a flow of freezing northeasterlies in the run-up to Christmas, originating deep in Europe, has resulted in a spectacular influx of wild geese into Britain. I was getting increasingly gripped by the reports of Russian White-fronted and Bean Geese popping up everywhere, well away from traditional East Coast haunts - including in Oxfordshire. The discovery of a 15-strong flock of Bean Geese on Otmoor made my mind up. Going all the way from London on Christmas Day would be ridiculous (bordering on deranged), but Boxing Day seemed socially acceptable. I had two aims - connect with the Bean Geese flock and then try to find my own wild geese on Port Meadow.

Why am I still focused on the patch despite apparently having left Oxford? Because it's an addiction... Well, I have a short stint back in the city from mid-January to the beginning of April and I had briefly been to Port Meadow twice this autumn when visiting friends. Surprisingly I actually enjoyed these short walks on the patch - the floods had refilled and even just with bins I saw an adult Mediterranean Gull come in to roost. Perhaps not obsessively going there every day is what's needed to keep it fresh.

In addition, there is something about wild geese that I find really evocative and apart from a flyover Pink-footed Goose I had never seen any on Port Meadow - it's something of a black hole for White-fronted Geese, partially due to the presence of a feral flock of gambelli for a few years which made it hard to be sure that any new arrivals weren't derived from these escapes. During the 2020/2021 winter White-fronted Goose influx I was convinced that I would find some on Port Meadow, and became increasingly despondent as the flock on Otmoor built up to over 120. No luck despite these huge numbers just a few miles away! I remembered that there was far more visible movement in the first week of the influx (which was correlated with birds being displaced due to heavy fog), before flocks settled down in favoured areas for the rest of the winter. I imagine that Port Meadow is too disturbed for wild geese to feel comfortable, so knew that my best chance of success would be to visit as soon as possible.

I arrived in Oxford mid-morning on Boxing Day and waited first for news of the Tundra Bean Geese, before planning to walk along the Thames towpath and do the Port Meadow roost. News of the Beans at Water Eaton resulted in a literal wild goose chase - I arrived, walked onto the site and no sooner had I begun to scan the fields a negative report was put out as the flock was apparently back on Otmoor! I headed straight there and briskly walked along the towpath to the Wetlands Watch hide. I quickly located a long, distant string of geese way out on Ashgrave towards Noke Farm, and started searching through them. It took a few minutes to find the first White-fronted Goose; then immediately afterwards I noticed the Tundra Beans behind it. Success! They were surprisingly hard to see as they kept walking behind undulations in the ground and going down into a pool to wash - I certainly saw at least 16, which corroborates with the total count of 18 from others earlier that morning. The birds were so far away and in such bad light that I didn't even bother to get the camera out, so only took a couple of digiscoped record shots.

I had my lunch in the hide tallying up White-fronted Geese (approximately 50 across Big Otmoor and Ashgrave) before driving to Godstow. The car park there is now pay and display which is rather annoying, so I parked in the village and walked to the Trout. It was a crisp and bright day but seriously cold, and I have been struggling to spend long periods outside recently without getting numb hands (e.g. whilst cycling). I walked across Godstow Lock and saw the resident flock of feral Greylag and Canada Geese milling around by the river. Immediately I noticed a group of smaller grey geese amongst them - success! Will they be Beans or White-fronts, I thought as I lifted my bins, although knew deep down that such a large group would almost certainly be the latter. Still absolutely wonderful to see and I have manifested finding a large flock on Port Meadow for so long.

There was one flock of 15 birds all together and 6 more off to the side. I watched them for a few minutes through bins, checking that all were 100% Russian White-fronted Geese rather than Greenland (a seriously rare bird in the county), and noted that quite a high proportion of the birds were juveniles. They became more alert as some walkers with dogs approached and I knew what was going to happen - surely enough after a few repeated runs by the dogs all of the geese took to the air, most settling again on the river but the White-fronts seemed rather more wary and began circling.

Quite a few immature birds visible in these images

I suspected that they would eventually settle on the floods and so continued down the river towards the Perch to set up my scope for the roost. I encountered the (presumed feral) Ross's Goose showing nicely with a few Canada Geese further down the river - I'm aware that this bird is contentious amongst the year-listers as it counts on the eBird leaderboard despite being obviously duff. A nice male Goosander also offered some unusually close views.

The river had broken its banks recently and the waters were now receding , so most of the gulls and wildfowl were far away on the main flood rather than on the line of islands that sometimes form when the water levels are at their highest. In these conditions diving ducks sometimes visit the floods and I was pleased to see a Tufted Duck swimming amongst the Wigeon and Teal, along with a few Pintail. Three Black-tailed Godwits had joined the Lapwings although there were no Golden Plovers today.

Grainy videograb of the Godwits

As expected, the White-fronted Geese flew in from the north calling and settled on a spit near the river, just like their feral counterparts used to do each evening. They were a real feature of the Port Meadow roost for a few years, usually coming in after dark and accompanied by a couple of Bar-headed Geese and some hybrid offspring. I've not seen them regularly for a while although they may be lurking elsewhere in the county.

I turned my attention towards the gulls and quickly found an adult Caspian Gull preening on an island, together with a few Common Gulls and a pair of unseasonal Shelduck. James Hammond and Ben Sheldon arrived to see the geese so the Caspian Gull was a nice bonus.

A second Caspian Gull soon appeared, initially swimming around on the water and later joining the first individual roosting on and island. In the field I called this bird as a subadult (4cy) due to slightly more black in the wing tip and some dark markings around the bill, but having looked at the video stills all the primary coverts look plain grey and adult-type to me, so that's what it should probably go down as. I found a third Caspian Gull, a 2cy, at last light. At least three Yellow-legged Gulls were also present in the roost.

The second adult Caspian Gull - shorter tongues on the primaries than the first

Both birds together

2cy Caspian Gull - not the best looking bird

At dusk all the birds were flushed by something unseen and the White-fronted Geese took off to the north. As far as I'm aware they haven't been seen today so it seems like I timed my visit perfectly. The walk back to Godstow was long and cold - we heard a Tawny Owl calling and despite Ben's best attempts to avoid looking at the Ross's Goose it has been added to the year list!

Quite a nice day out in the end with all targets achieved - perhaps the only way it could have been better would be finding Tundra Bean Geese as well but that'll have to be the carrot on a stick for the rest of the winter. In recent years (although before my time) I think there has only been one record of this species, in April. It was considered an escape, so it's a real patch mega and I am eagerly anticipating adding it to my list along with Brent Goose - there seem to be a few displaced inland with the recent weather.

A lovely purple hue after sunset

What I have found with patch birding is that the scarce migrants do seem to occur when expected, usually off the back of some sort of influx. This has been the case for several of my most recent patch ticks - White-fronted Goose, Crossbill, Kittiwake, Hawfinch, and Yellow-browed Warbler. For each of these there has been some "event" which has prompted me to be particularly attentive out or alter my search to maximise my chances of connecting with them. In this (rather extreme) instance I ended up driving two hours back to Oxford and walking the northern end of the Meadow, which I never usually do. Sometimes you do have to wait for a few national influxes to occur before striking lucky, like with these geese, but targeted searching does seem to pay off in the end. It's the really rare birds that occur randomly out of the blue and require you to put in some serious hours to have a chance of finding one.

Last days in Oxford

1w male Bluethroat, Otmoor

Up until today I was pretty certain that my last few days as a permanent resident of Oxfordshire would end with a whimper rather than a bang. My efforts on Port Meadow to yield just one more good bird have largely failed - vismig has tailed off in the low winds, with only dregs of Meadow Pipit and hirundine passage, although a few Skylarks and Song Thrushes have seemingly started moving now.

When there are no birds to look at on the meadow at least the weather usually provides some interest - this is a "fog bow", an apparently rare phenomenon which I've never seen before. It started as a small pale area in the haze and then broadened out into a arc, which got fainter and wider as the sun rose higher.

A protracted Sunday stomp around the entire meadow did, however, produce a Glossy Ibis - a bird so high on my "expected" list, given the recent influx, that it barely felt like an achievement at all. I had actually stopped to sit down in Burgess Field when it appeared above the tree tops, presumably having flown right over the roofs of the houses in Jericho, and continued west less than ten metres above my head. Unfortunately I was facing straight into the sun, but I've managed to recover a bit of detail from the dark areas in the photos.

This is the seventh Glossy Ibis I have seen on patch and the fifth I've found (including the flock of three). I suspect if there was some water on the meadow at the moment we would have had several already! A flock of three Goosander north along the river was also notable for the early date.

I had resigned myself to the fact that this would probably be the last good bird I saw in Oxfordshire for the time being, so I was in slight disbelief yesterday upon receiving the news that a Bluethroat had been found at Otmoor by Jeremy Dexter, who is really on a roll this year - having also found Marsh Sandpiper and Green-winged Teal. The timing was terrible - I had just been on a cycle ride and it was my last evening in Oxford. The next day, I would have to pack everything up before driving four hours to Flamborough. There was no chance of trying to connect that night, so I decided to set my alarm for 5am and just power through.

Photos of the bird were posted on the blog and I checked these with some relief before going to bed, having felt rather uneasy beforehand. I awoke after a fitful night's sleep (dreaming, bizarrely, of losing my favourite birding hat) and arrived in the Otmoor car park at 05:45. One other car pulled up - Dave Lowe. Clearly this was the hard core contingent, and I was glad for some company on the long walk to screen two. The sun was just starting to rise, and we were joined by Max Buckley, who had run from his house to add the bird to an "on foot" twitching list.

Pete Roby, Adam Hartley, Wayne Paes and Simon Myers were next to arrive, just as it turned light enough to begin scanning along the edges of the reeds. I called a passerine sp. moving along the edge of the pool - Sedge Warbler, looking decidedly rare. The next false alarm was a Dunnock. There had also been a Spotted Redshank reported, of which there was no sign.

I had just started to hear some murmurings of discontent when I saw a movement in the reeds that I knew was the Bluethroat. It was much further away than the cut area by a pool where the bird had been seen yesterday, but from the way it moved I was pretty certain this had to be it. I tried to get everyone onto the area where I was looking, but there were really no landmarks to use except for individual white feathers washed up on the shoreline and a sleeping Snipe. The exasperation and panic that followed in the next few minutes, was, looking back at the video I took, absolute comedy gold - but in the moment it was intensely stressful. There is always a lot of pressure if you are the first one to get onto the bird at a twitch, and the Bluethroat was not behaving - constantly flitting in and out of the reeds and barely showing at all. I think Adam was next to get onto it, followed by Pete, but it took several minutes for everyone to connect with the bird.

The Bluethroat reached the pool where it had been seen yesterday as a few more people arrived, and became marginally easier to see as it worked its way along the cut reeds lining the pool. My attempts at stills photos were totally unsuccessful, but even in the gloom I was able to get some record video footage which I was quite pleased with, and the stills are taken from this clip. It ended up showing quite well for about ten minutes before disappearing round a corner into the reeds, which I took as my cue to leave.

Turn up the video quality!

What a fantastic bird. I've seen a few in Britain previously but I don't think any have conjured up the excitement of this one. It was also really nice to get to see everyone at the twitch and say goodbye on my last day - almost mythical the way this has turned out.

There is a possibility that I'll be in Oxford for a short period early next year doing some non-academic work, but not confirmed yet and not sure if I'll have much time for birding, so this is a nice note to end on I think. I have started writing a blog post summarising my time birding in Oxfordshire but it's beginning to balloon into a self-indulgent essay, so it needs focusing before I publish it. Just about survived the journey to Flamborough so hopefully over the next few days there'll a few things still kicking around from the easterlies last week.

Non-local birding

Rainbow over Portland Bird Observatory

I've had some rather good birding trips away from Oxfordshire over the last few weeks, which I'll aim to summarise in this combined set of trip reports. I've also had a totally unsuccessful weekend in Cornwall failing to see any large shearwaters (perhaps some sort of record for longest time spent staring at the Cornish sea without any reward), so will gloss over that - although did see the Scillies for the first time.

St Mary's Harbour from a day trip on the Scillonian

The Suffolk double of Black Stork and breeding Zitting Cisticola (both seemingly settled and easy to twitch) was too enticing to pass up, so I decided to head down for a day trip with James Hammond on 23rd August. Due to some poor planning we only arrived in Suffolk at 3pm, and by this time our first target, the juvenile Black Stork, was nowhere to be seen. We found a loose group of people milling around on top of the dyke looking at nothing in particular - always a bad sign at a twitch. Luckily, after about half an hour I picked up the bird flying in high from the west. Pterodactyl-like in flight, it then proceeded to land right in front of us and began feeding along that famous ditch, the subject of so many tepid social media posts recently. I tried to motivate myself to take a few photos.

As I was watching the Black Stork, I heard an unfamiliar yet strangely familiar call ring out overhead. I looked up and saw two distant waders circling behind the dyke. It took a few seconds for my brain to connect the call with these birds and I realised that it was two Dotterels, having clearly just flown in-off. I panicked slightly trying to get a photo - the birds were specks, but luckily they dived low over the fields, perhaps looking for a place to settle, and I managed to get a few shots before they disappeared inland. I wandered over to some of the assembled twitchers further down the path and sheepishly enquired as to whether they had seen the two Dotterels fly straight over their heads. "Oh, really?" They hadn't, and didn't seem to care much either!

From the photos, at least one of the birds is an adult, evidenced by the traces of red on the underside and active primary moult. I was especially pleased to have picked up the calls on my sound recorder, as I wasn't sure that they would be loud enough. There is the typical flight call (like a short, buzzy Redshank or Golden Plover) but also a series of Oystercatcher-like contact calls interspersed between these, which I haven't heard before. Overall a great experience.

It was already getting dark as we headed to Walberswick but thankfully there was enough light left to connect with one of the Zitting Cisticolas. Initially heard-only, it then perched up on the reeds for 30 seconds, offering some decent scope views. A near-adult Caspian Gull was also sitting on the beach.

All target birds acquired and back in Oxford before midnight. This trip has convinced me that twitching is acceptable so long as I find some good birds along the way!

I timed my autumn Portland stay for the second week of September this year to coincide with some decent passerine passage for ringing. Last year I was there at the end of August, where numbers can be high but potential for scarcities a bit lower. In any case, a run of easterlies the week before gave me some hope, and I booked in for 6th to 13th September.

Day one kicked off with a Wryneck trapped at Culverwell - although I've seen them in the hand before, this was the first that I have ringed, and I felt quite privileged to do so.

Ringing the Wryneck with Mark Cutts and Roger Booth

Despite the promising weather, the quantity of birds in the nets was disappointing, as was the quality of overhead passage. This mid-morning lull was shattered by a call from Martin saying that he was "99.5%" sure" that he had just flushed a Booted Warbler in the Crown Estate Field! Utter panic in the Obs as everyone raced down the drive, finding Martin standing near a net running through some low crop. Apparently the bird had flown from these crops into the hedge bordering the field, and therefore should still be possible to flush towards the nets. However, the next twenty minutes of slow walking around the field by the assembled ringers failed to pin it down, and I wondered if it had managed to sneak along the hedge away towards the Top Fields.

Suddenly a shout from Martin alerted us to the bird flying from the hedge back into the crops, and everyone surrounded it. I had my first subliminal views of it in flight, and having previously seen neither Booted nor Sykes's Warbler, I was struck by how pale and obviously different it looked - slightly larger than a Phylloscopus, and perhaps slightly lumbering, but it was the colour that really stood out. Unfortunately this brief view ended with the bird flying not into the net, but straight over it towards the pond! After another ten minutes of it evading the nets, but thankfully staying in the area, a monofilament mist net was erected in the crop ride. Being much less visible than regular mist nets, this was successful in capturing the bird. A fantastic moment when Martin lifted it out of the net - finally my Portland visits coincide with the discovery of a proper rarity! If I had been in a blogging mindset, I might have thought to take some photos of the scene, so some photos in the hand will have to suffice.

BOOTED WARBLER trapped in the Crown Estate Field

[image or embed]

— Portland Bird Observatory (@portlandbirdobs.bsky.social) 8 September 2025 at 13:28

Grahame Walbridge pointing out some features on the Booted Warbler

Although no calls were heard, Sykes's Warbler, I think, was eliminated on the basis of a combination of biometrics, and the bird was left unaged due to an odd state of wear/moult. See the Portland blog for a more in-depth analysis (here).

A check of Church Ope Cove and Coombefield later produced a single Pied Flycatcher and two Spotted Flycatchers although very few warblers.

Day two proceeded in much the same way as day one, but without any scarcities materialising. I therefore decided to leave the garden mist nets to Roger on day three, and headed down to the Bill to check the thousands-strong gull flock that had been building up on the sea off of the West Cliffs throughout the morning. Some of these were settled quite close off of the eastern side of the Bill and amongst them was a juvenile Yellow-legged Gull.

On the western side of Pulpit Rock a few gulls were flying in and I was rewarded with the sight of a fantastic male Caspian Gull in the melee - the size of Great Black-backed Gull and carrying a stick in its beak, as they so often do. Amazingly it flew closer and closer until it was right over my head.

With a bit of editing one of the last photos in the sequence has turned into my favourite-ever image of Caspian Gull - with the white head appearing from behind the clean brown wing almost like a shawl. Plus it shows their curious tendency to carry around objects and defend these from other gulls!

It is a running joke that I cannot go to Portland without finding a Caspian Gull, which is usually a scarce bird in Dorset. Therefore having achieved my mission for this trip, I headed back to the Obs for lunch. However, it seems this was only the start of the day's strange cachinnans "event": Mark texted me a picture of another individual in the fields at Culverwell, whilst Jodie found a third whilst twitching it. I hadn't managed to see a juvenile Caspian Gull in Oxfordshire yet this autumn, so was pretty pleased with this nice little run of birds.

As the wind picked up and a belt of rain rolled in I had a short seawatch from the Obs and got lucky with a brief juvenile Sabine's Gull, which unfortunately no one else saw as it disappeared in and out of massive wave troughs. A single Bar-tailed Godwit also flew south, which was corroborated by a flock of 13 at Ferrybridge. A final check of Culverwell in the evening failed to produce any more gulls but I was treated to the incredible sight of a migrating flock of Grey Herons heading southeast - 14 at first, which were joined by another five over the sea.

All carefully checked for Purple Herons!

On day four I decided to try and capitalise on this potential Caspian Gull influx with a thorough search of the East Cliff fields before heading to Ferrybridge. I was pleased to find another pristine juvenile showing at close range next to Culverwell, and a further two on the lagoon a Ferrybridge (one of which was another brutish male and could have invited confusion with Yellow-legged Gull). All of these were different birds to the three seen yesterday!

Bird 2

Bird 3

Bird 3

Bird 4 - again carrying a fidget toy around!

A surprising number of gulls were coming and going from the lagoon that evening including a few Yellow-legged Gulls, and amongst the waders were the two Little Stints and a fresh Curlew Sandpiper. 

Also had the fantastic experience of watching some Tuna leaping on a seawatch, which I managed to capture on video.

With strong winds overnight, day five started with the news of a juvenile Sabine's Gull wrecked in Chesil Cove. As with many birds on stormy days in the Cove, it was a struggle to locate at first, but then showed beautifully, flying back and forth along the surf.

I saw another Caspian Gull distantly on a morning seawatch from the Obs, along with the usual Balearic Shearwaters and Arctic Skuas.

Caspian Gull - not sure whether this is one of the previously-seen individuals

Balearic Shearwater

Pale-phase Arctic Skua

The rest of the day was a bit of a non-event in the wind, but I did my evening check of the East Cliffs gull flocks and found another three juvenile Caspian Gulls - extraordinary stuff for Portland!

Bird 5

Bird 6

Bird 7

Bird 7

Bird 7

On day six I went back to Chesil to see if the Sabine's was still present - it wasn't, but I was pleased to pick up a distant Grey Phalarope bobbing between huge waves some distance out in the bay. Apparently found independently by others that morning, it showed rather better after I left. My views were limited to just bins and without the 2x extender on my camera, so the photos are shocking. Still, pleased to add this species to the self-found list.

Spot the Phalarope!

Two Firecrests at Pennsylvania Castle were the first of the autumn for me and on the way back to the Obs I chanced upon a couple of birders watching a new Dutch-ringed Caspian Gull (Darvic code A:9) in the fields at Culverwell - very nice. A final evening check of Ferrybridge revealed three more juvenile Caspian Gulls including a fantastic advanced individual with loads of moulting coverts (bird 9) and a second Dutch-ringed bird, which was a bit more difficult to be sure of the identification at first as it was so dark, especially on the underwing.

Bird 8

Bird 8

Bird 9

Bird 10 - Dutch-ringed

Bird 10 - note dark underwing

Bird 10

The Little Stints were still present and an Arctic Tern flew through at dusk.

The wind finally dropped on day seven, and I had a pleasant walk around the Top Fields and Slopes in the first properly bird-able conditions for several days. Overhead passage was evident, and I counted approximately 190 Meadow Pipits, and handful of Tree Pipits (hard to count as a couple were obviously grounded and flying around), 13 Grey Wagtails (a real feature of autumn vismigging at Portland) and a few oddities - Marsh Harrier over the Crown Estate Fields, heard-only Ringed Plover and high-flying Bar-tailed Godwit over the land.

Standard flight views of Tree Pipit

Late morning a band of heavy rain set in and further attempts to find Caspian Gulls were scuppered, so I headed home. A really good mix of birds this trip and so lucky to jam in on the Booted Warbler being found. In addition to the ten individual Caspian Gulls which I documented, there were also at least three more found whilst I was there and a couple more afterwards, which is an exceptional number. Having been branded "Ein Autistischenverstandfurcacchinnans" by Martin on the Portland blog, I was tempted to respond with a satirical piece about the curious association between Caspian Gull records and my presence at the Obs. However, it does seem that my trip this year genuinely did coincide with some sort of Caspian Gull influx to the southwest, with Steve Waite on the Axe in Devon and Steve Lavington at Keyhaven in Hampshire both reporting multiple individuals at locations where they're still a decent bird to find. In contrast, numbers have been low in Oxfordshire and other inland sites this autumn - presumably something to do with the recent weather conditions has pushed loads of gulls down the Channel.

You may have noticed that some of the photography in the last two blog posts is not up to the usual standard. The reason for this is that some of them are video stills using my new dual camera/scope setup, which enables me to get footage of birds seen on seawatches or distantly in gull roosts. The resulting images are jpegs and therefore cannot be run through the DXO denoising software that I used for all my other photos. Despite being of relatively poor quality, I've found it incredibly useful and far better than phonescoping in almost all situations. With the 2x extender on the Olympus 300mm F4, plus the MFT 2x crop factor and 1.4x digital teleconverter (I know the latter is simply pixel interpolation but it's super useful for getting 4k video which you can then crop down further), the resulting magnification is approximately 35x - similar to a spotting scope. I've tried using the same setup for conventional photography at these distances as well and the results are mediocre even with DXO processing - the bird is just too small in the frame. The Zitting Cisticola, for example, was an absolute speck, and that video grab is already amongst the better images available of it.

The same setup as described by Mike McKee in British Birds, using a short tripod centre column to attach an auxiliary ball head to the main two-way video head

The benefits of this setup really paid off on a trip back to Kent last week. With a fresh north/northeasterly blowing I decided to head to Reculver for a seawatch. It's a favourite location of mine as I like how you can basically see all of the vertical height of the sea from beach to horizon in a single scope view, and the birds are often at a nice distance. A bit like the view from the Portland patio, in fact, although much closer. Cornwall seawatching frustrates me in comparison as there is just so much sea to look at - it's a lot easier to miss things, and at sites like Pendeen I feel like I have to keep switching to bins for birds passing inside of the rocks.

I arrived at around 07:30 and set up my scope along with a few local seawatchers in the ruins of Reculver towers, which provide some shelter from the wind. The morning started slowly, with just a couple of Arctic Skuas, the odd flock of Wigeon and Brent Geese and a few Sandwich Terns. Most of these birds were going west, with a close-in skua one of the first individuals heading back east after presumably U-turning in the Thames estuary or Swale. This bird almost evaded identification as it went by so close and fast, and I only got onto it as it was flying away from us. Luckily, I recorded some video which confirmed it as a Great Skua.

Wigeon passing the wind farm - always like seeing duck movements in autumn

Another Wigeon flock

Great Skua

After a slow first hour the seawatch gradually improved, and we saw a few more Arctic Skuas (including two flocks of three birds), a handful of Little Gulls, Common Terns, Black Tern, Red-throated Diver, Pintail, Teal and Common Scoter - excellent variety although not a big passage day. Whilst trying to get people onto a distant Arctic Skua flying east under the wind farm, a juvenile Sabine's Gull drifted across my scope view going the other way. Slight panic trying to get people onto it as it was disappearing round to the left, where the ruins blocked the view for those sitting behind the wall, but I think everyone saw it and I was glad to get some more video as evidence. I think the recent Portland trip and "subliminal" Sabine's sighting has really driven home the "no photo, no record" mindset!

Juvenile Sabine's Gull - showed a bit better than this pic suggests, roughly mid-distance, but they are small birds...

Black Tern

Arctic Skuas

Two more skuas then appeared from the east and I noted that one was obviously bigger and more heavyset compared to the other - I couldn't see much plumage detail at that distance but suggested to the group that it could be a juvenile Pomarine Skua. I was met with silence so wasn't sure if they had heard. As they got closer I was sure that I could see more white in the underwing than the accompanying Arctic Skua and that its wings were broader. After they went out of view I asked the group what they thought of these birds and was quite surprised when they unanimously agreed that it was two Arctic Skuas, and didn't protest much. I had taken some video and was fully expecting it to be a learning experience when checking later, so I was actually a bit annoyed to be met with these images - an obvious Pomarine Skua... I wish I had stood up for myself a bit more! I've detailed some of the key identification points below but I think it was fairly clear even from the flight pattern that this wasn't an Arctic, almost lumbering with much slower wingbeats. I've not yet worked out how to edit and stabilise my videos properly (Mike McKee style...) so I've saved them all and just exported stills for the time being.

Underwing comparison with Arctic Skua - note presence of two white "flashes" on the underwing (caused by white bases to both the primaries and primary coverts - indicative of Pomarine Skua but a combination which, exceptionally, can be shown by Arctic Skua as well).

This photo really highlights the difference in structure - the wings are half again as broad as the Arctic Skua and it is much more barrel-chested. Note also the dark head.

Size difference apparent here and the combination of paler barred rump and dark head/nape basically never shown by Arctic Skua

Again, this really shows that the "VAR" approach to birding - with continuous sound recording and videoing birds during seawatches - massively improves the quality of records and enables a bit of fact checking especially if there are disagreements. On a personal level it also stops me second guessing anything that I see/hear briefly and reins in any attempts at stringing.

In the afternoon I checked South Foreland in the hopes of vismig and grounded passerines. Very little overhead movement but I chanced upon a Pied Flycatcher in Langdon Hole and a male Black Redstart at Fan Bay. Also notable were three Black-tailed Godwits flying in-off the sea.

Pied Flycatcher - didn't really settle nicely, kept bombing around the bushes

Chiffchaff

Black-tailed Godwits

With a few more trips planned in October I hope to do trip reports in a more timely manner, rather than long summaries like this post. I've got Yorkshire booked for next week and Cornwall directly afterwards - will be a mix of ringing and birding so hopefully still some good birds to come before end of autumn!