Crippled Birding

Reading all these pager messages & tweets regarding all these delightful migrants cropping up on the coast is killing me. I had been seriously considering coming out of retirement this autumn & starting to bird/twitch further afield until...

Nearly two weeks ago I broke my foot (the fourth metatarsal half way down my fucking foot to be exact). I'd gone downstairs in the dead of night to grab a drink & had completely forgotten that my wife had moved the coffee table and thus ploughed into it with bare feet. It didn't hurt at the time but next day was bleedin' agony so a trip to A&E followed, an X-ray was performed and the result being 6 weeks off work. Not a bad time to be off work I hear you cry but not being able to drive/walk makes it as pointless/beneficial as a bottle of non-alcoholic rouge juice!
So I'm basically confined to the house & garden, which may not be as bad as it sounds; we moved here in mid April this year and since then I've recorded a quite impressive 62 species (Tree Pipit added today) which includes NINE species of raptor (HB, Marsh Harrier, Red Kite, Peregrine, Osprey, Hobby, Buzzard, Sprawk & Kestrel). Other highlights have been a few Cuckoos, a Garganey that flew south at dusk on 11th June, 2 Oystercatchers over on 24th June & 8 Crossbills that flew NE on 6th September - I suppose it helps being so close to farmland and The Dukeries/Sherwood Forest.

 As I stated in my previous post in late May, I'm now perfectly placed for twitching all four corners of Notts should anything rock up and in early June I manage to bag my first Notts tick since December 2013 with a snazzy Red-necked Phal at Langford Lowfields.

Unfortunately I haven't added another since despite a few 'wanted birds' occurring in the county since. I dipped a Gull-billed Tern at Lound, couldn't get to a Rose-coloured Starling in Nottingham before dark and a Black Stork was just too brief. In all honesty I've hardly birded at all during the summer and the Notts year-list resurgence I nodded to at the end of my previous post didn't happen. I simply lost interest in chasing after mundane species that I've seen loads of times before in the county plus the fact the guys who were ahead of me were managing to connect with everything & I just couldn't compete - even a county year list costs money (fuel) that I simply couldn't justify splashing out on.
Now since moving here I've spent many hours scouring Google maps looking for a new patch. I had started watching Budby Flash but with the place already well covered by the regulars, I felt like I was stepping on their toes and decided to concentrate my efforts on finding somewhere close by that is under watched but has potential. Unfortunately I really can't find anywhere like that so have chosen to cover an area of arable land just east of my house. It takes literally three minutes to get to walking (perhaps a little longer if I'm hopping) and is quite obviously under watched. In the pic below, my house is where the red dot is on the left and the patchwork of fields is where I hope to start watching.

 That said, I certainly won't be doing any stomping around those fields until early October at least due to this bastard broken foot so in the meantime I'm restricted to viz-migging from the garden but with a plentiful supply of coffee, shelter only feet away and a proper toilet instead of a convenient hawthorn bush, it's not all bad and at least I'll not be suffering from 'birding burnout' when the proper shit kicks off in October!

@NottsBirdingHQ

Nine months ago I scribed some rouge juice influenced nonsense about year listing in Notts, I prattled on about how I was on course to break the record and also muttered some bollocks at the end of the post about perhaps doing some UK twitching again. Well I must have had three bottles that night cos I did neither of those things. I finished the year on 179 (adding just 7 birds in the last 4 months). These were Great White Egret, Little Stint, Golden Plover, Pec' Sand', Pink footed Goose & Black Redstart. It really was an appalling autumn. So, at the start of this year I vowed NEVER to county year-list but within a couple of days I'd forgotten all about that vow & was chasing all manner of shite left, right & centre....
It's now the end of May. My county year-list currently sits on a quite horrendous 153. I'm sat in my kitchen in my house in NOTTINGHAMSHIRE (Yes, I moved back to my homeland just over a month ago and god does it feel fucking good - probably more on that later) typing this, my vocabulary is being lubricated by a nice bottle of Tempranillo, the wife & babby are out at a party & Chief Brody is watching the FA Cup final. Now, my regular readers/fans/sycophants/lovers will no doubt be pondering why I've suddenly decided to scribe again after it seemed that I'd retired from this torrid stuff. Well it's primarily the fault of this guy...

...Dave Morton. Budby Flash & Notts stalwart. This morning at Budby Flash (my new patch - although I ain't stepping on no ones toes I hope) he was telling me how he enjoyed reading other birders blogs and particularly enjoyed some of my older posts, when I used to blog regularly. We chatted about folks scribing stuff & it inspired me to dig the laptop out & start banging these buttons again (I've so far missed all the goals in the FA cup cos of this!). He does remind me of a Brummie twitcher whom I used to have a lot of time for - purely in the way he dresses and his beard. Birding skillz wise, Dave is in a different league. Look at this pic of the infamous Brummie and you can see what I mean...

Anyway, I digress, so, 153. Last year I finished April on 158 so you can see I'm way behind. The current leader of the pack this year is on 168, 2nd position is on 165, 3rd is 160 & then me. I was in 1st or 2nd position throughout the year until mid April when I foolishly jetted off to Cyprus for 11 nights and thus killed all hopes of topping the table. Now Cyprus was pretty special, I saw some pretty snazzy birds, drank lots of booze, ate some pretty tasty grub (and some not so tasty) & got a decent tan.Predictably tho', the shadow of Notts Life Listing enveloped me a few days into my holiday when I was bombarded by loads of smug, childish, gloating Notts bastards informing me that a Night Heron was showing its tits at Attenborough. I knew it would happen though. Last September I went to Bulgaria & having not had a county tick for 9 months, on my first full day in the Balkans, the first twitchable Bonxie for 20+ years decided to loaf about at Hoveringham. 

I was looking at this when I started getting texts about the Attenborough bird - Kick in the balls!

Putting Cyprus (& that heron) aside, it's been a rather horrific spring for me. Both Monty's & Red-necked Phal have occurred in the county but untwitchable. I dipped the Ring-billed Gull despite putting in a few hours in torrential rain, only for it to reappear once I was at home. I've now not added a bird to my Notts list since December 2013. Somethings got to give soon. Being based now almost centrally in the county I'm in a perfect base to hit all corners of Notts, my gear is always primed ready to be launched into the motor, I now only work three days a week thus giving me 4/7 days free and emergency fuel funds are stashed but I still ponder where my next tick will come from....

Anyway, this year-list. I'm still missing Common Sand, Gropper, Whimbrel, Sanderling, Nightjar, Spotted Fly', Greenshank, Whinchat, Black Tern, Kittiwake, HB, Little Gull & Crossbill. I did consider (& almost did) jacking it in but in recent weeks I've slowly started climbing back up the rungs. I very much doubt an assault on the lead is possible but as I learnt at the beginning of the year, I'll Never Say Never Again... 

Steve Dunn will return....