Interesting redpoll on Tresco

 

WESTERN BONELLI'S WARBLER, Newmans Pottery, Garrison

  This morning I got a call from visiting birder, Andrew Gardene, to tell me that he had just found a BONELLI'S WARBLER sp, as he had not heard it call, feeding in Elms just off the road leading down to Newmans Pottery. I couldn't be there for a while and on my second visit, the bird performed very well in the lower Elms.

  Yesterday after work in the calm sunny conditions, I canoed across to Samson. For the hour that I was there, all I got was 7 Wheatear, 25 White Wagtail and 100+Linnet. 10 minutes from Samson and I arrived on Tresco. Here I walked from South Beach towards Skirt Island and when I reached the latter site,  I found the SHORT-BILLED DOWITCHER feeding in the seaweed at the top of beach as it was high tide. I got ahead of it and lay down and waited for it to come to me. It did, closer and closer, and when it was half a meter away, a juvenile male Peregrine came through and the dowitcher  crouched as low as it could. When the danger had passed, instead of continuing to feed, the damn stupid thing stayed there. If I reached my arm out, I could of touched it! I lay still, taking pics and video, and it was not until 10 minutes later that it decided to feed again. Amazing stuff!

 

 

 

  Leaving the dowitcher, I quickly made my way to the Abbey Pool. On the path I almost trod on, what I thought was going to be a Lapland Bunting, a redpoll. It was only a few meters away and I could clearly see that it was not a Lesser Redpool. After a couple of minutes, the bird let me approach it until I was almost on top of  it. Like the dowitcher, I could of touched it! What I observed looked was a probable MEALY REDPOLLchunky redpoll with white tramlines and a streaking white rump. like a, but what the hell do I know!? The light was disappearing fast and all I could do was take some pics and video and make a move back to the canoe.

 

 

Probable MEALY REDPOLL? Both the dowitcher and the redpoll were taken with me camcorder.

 

My trusty canoe on Samson 

 

A strange cloud formation over the harbour

  
Mercury Rev is an American alternative rock group, that formed in the late 1980s in Buffalo, New York. The 1998 release of the acclaimed Deserter's Songs (which featured appearances by Garth Hudson and the late Levon Helm of The Band) made Mercury Rev unexpected rock stars. In the UK, NME magazine made Deserter's Songs their Album of the Year Donahue's earnest, high-pitched vocals and concentration on relatively concise, melodic songs gave the band's material an entirely new feel and much increased popularity (Deserter's Songs spawned three UK Top 40 singles. This is my favorite song from that LP 'The Funny Bird'