I hold my hands up, Its been far too long since my last post. Being one of the worlds leading experts in palaeontology doesn't lend itself to much time for blog entries. I also blame my friends who one after the other have fallen into the evil trap that is marriage. The fools! Stags and weddings are good fun though.
Anyhow, my patch has been awesome. Following on from Green-winged Teal and American wigeon, (which I have mentioned in previous posts) I managed to find a stunning male Garganey on the patch. A bird I have always wanted to run into in Clonakilty. I was in duck heaven. But it gets better, much much better. First of all Seppy failed miserably in his attempts to twitch my Garganey. This made me feel warm and cosy inside. Here is the icing on the cake however. In a feeble attempt to piss me off, Seppy sent me a text laced with bitterness saying something like " Pair of Tufties on Kilkeran Lake. beats your Garganey any day". Not wanting to stoop to his petty behaviour I didnt reply. That is until about 2 days later when I found these babies on my own patch.
Ducks betraying poor Seppy
The highlight of the year was definitely the stunning ( but injured) Little-ringed Plover that I found in July. This was a life tick for me. I like to think that it somehow repaired its own wing and flew off to over winter somewhere exotic. I dont like to think about what actually happened to the bird.
Other noteworthy birds on the patch include a lovely Lesser Yellowlegs, Corey's Shearwater and a little gull that I initially thought was a pied wagtail. This leaves me at 116 species for the year.
On a side note I spotted Basil Faulty in Skibbereen last week twitching 2 Olympic silver medallists. The unfortunate O'Donovan brothers were lucky to get away from him. Weirdo!!
Stringing a little gull out of a pied wag? Skillz!
ReplyDeleteI was just practising my long-lens papping technique before autumn twitches. The rowing fellas were small, skinny, unpredictable and moved around a lot. They were also high up on top of a double decker bus. The mob pushing and shoving through the streets was EXACTLY like the scrum you get twitching a rare.
ReplyDeleteThe perfect preparation for better autumn record shots!