A day too late...

Sadly that always seems to be the case with me that I am always busy when it comes to decent seawatching off Titchwell and this week was no different. 

Although I did manage to sneak down to the beach for a short while (seeing a couple of Manx and a flock of 11 bonxie) most of the day was spent sorting out the last of my things in the office so missed out on all the action once again. A calling yellow browed warbler outside the office was decent compensation though.

Although the winds had dropped by the evening I still decided to get out early and see what was moving. Despite it being still very dull on the walk down to the beach the 2 juv little stints were still present on the fresh marsh with the dunlin flock but light wasn't really good enough to look for much else.
The wind really wasn't going to help bring any birds in close now it had gone the west and died but there were still a few bits about. The short eared owl was still about hunting around Thornham Point along with a couple of marsh harriers.

There wasn't much movement on the sea with only 9 bonxie and 2 arctic skuas in the 90mins I spent watching although the wildfowl passage was good. Without the strong north wind, many of the duck flocks were staying far out and the haze meant that identifying them impossible. On jizz, most of the flocks looked like teal and wigeon. I must admit I was a bit fed up with missing out again so headed off. 

My brief watch did record
8 pintail
173 teal
31 wigeon
6 RB merganser
3 shelduck
1 razorbill
3 sandwich tern.

On the walk back down the path, the juv curlew sand that had been found by Alan Davies was showing well right under the path with the dunlin flock.

On the way home I decided to have a little walk around the Choseley barns arrea, Although the area around the barns is much quieter these days for birds, the field margins in the whole area are excellent. The farm have been planting wild-bird mixes along many of the field margins and they are really doing the trick. In the 'dip' south of the barns with millett content within the mix id proving very popular with the small finches. 20 linnet, 20 goldfinch, 10 yellowhammer and a rather smart corn bunting were feeding by the road. The margins run between the barns south to the village and I'm sure will only get better as the winter weather arrives. Fingers crossed that is something good turns up in the flock that people behave...