Painful 'Legs' Lead to Arctic Pleasure

Mon 3rd Sep, 2012

Sharing the thrill of finding a rare bird with friends is one of the most exciting experiences for a birder. Saturday 1st September was a day I shall never forget when frustration and joy fell in equal measure.

YCN's first migrant seabird tour of Flamborough in partnership with Birding Frontiers was due to start at 08.30. I had  just enough time to spend an hour at South Landing checking the waders on the beach.

At 06.50 I started sifting through the sanderlings, redshanks and godwits among the mass of gulls all feasting on sand flies in the seaweed. My attention was grabbed by a wader being harassed by the redshank. After about 10 minutes gathering notes I was sure I was watching a Lesser Yellowlegs from North America! To get the news out to other birders a dash up the hill was required to get a signal on my mobile. As I struggled and cursed modern technology a car drove past me down to the beach. Enter the inevitable bounding poodle crashing into the water and sending my Yellowlegs flying with most of the other waders! Bad end to a lone rare bird find.

Fast forward from wheeling skuas and effortless shearwaters on our sea-watch to a mid afternoon stroll with our tour down Old Fall path. "We're now on the famous Old Fall" Martin Garner exclaimed and I added optimistically: "It's on quiet migrant days like today when the really rare birds are found!"

On reaching the plantation we were joined by Andy Malley, a local birder. "I saw a warbler for a split second with a strong supercillium' Andy told us, but he had spent over an hour trying to re-find the bird without luck. Our small team decided to spilt up and search the wood. Andy returned to the scene of the crime: always a top tip for re-finding rare birds! After a long wait, we at last saw a bird we thought was a Greenish Warbler.  A check and double-check of identification features was needed, and we took the option to check biometrics by phoning a friend. The photos confirmed our suspicions - this really was a wonderful Arctic Warbler! High fives for all involved, the thrill of the team rare bird find on the Great White Cape!

A ground-nesting bird of the northern forests of high Arctic Scandinavia and north-west Russia, the Arctic Warbler follows an incredibly long migration route to winter in south-east Asia, but a few birds can turn up in Britain in the autumn.

Richard Baines

YCN Director and Tour Leader