A couple of hours at sunny Fowlmere was rather unproductive. Around 150 Corn Buntings in stubble, but were difficult to see, so whether anything else was amongst them, who knows? A Hobby (first here for the year!) and a couple of Buzzards were about it.
At lunchtime, news of an empidonax flycatcher at Blakeny. Called Marcus, but he couldn’t make it so went alone. I updated him as he asked the following day…
“Yesterday was pretty amazing but not something I'd like to repeat too often. My legs are still aching now. Right at the end of Blakeney Point, a four mile walk from the Cley car-park. Doesn't sound too bad but it was one of the hardest walks I think I've ever done. Directly into gale force winds, rain and hail (so bad that it was hurting), walking on shingle. At times it felt like I was going backwards. At least one person didn't make it and turned back. Saw one bloke (think it may have been Bonser?) bent over throwing up. Of course I just ignored him as we're ruthless bastards when a first for Britain is at stake.
And no tick at the end of it! On views I had, I thought it was Yellow-bellied, but having seen the photos it isn't I guess. Will probably just go down as 'Trail' Flycatcher (i.e. Willow/Alder.) Hope it gets resolved as Alder (which based on range it almost certainly is) as this is the only North American emp' I need. Don't hold out much hope though. The file on the Cornish bird has been returned by the BOU to the BBRC and that was trapped, ringed, and DNA sampled (supposedly inconclusively.) The yanks apparently don't attempt to identify them when ringing in autumn.
Walking back from half-way house in the dark was fun too! Felt a bit sorry for the half a dozen late comers who missed it completely (I only made it with half an hour to spare.) Didn't feel quite so bad for the clearly Mad Franco who was still running towards it a good half an hour after it must have roosted with a good twenty minutes of running still to do! Guess they had to do it all again this morning.” and
“Forgot to mention that I got point blank views of two Purple Sand's (shame it was nearly dark) on the shingle. The waders simply couldn't fly; I watched a Grey Plover trying to fly into the wind but going backwards before it gave up and walked instead; it was that windy.”
Read All About it! Tabloid Trash 1 Tabloid Trash 2
