cliftonbirding: General year ticking, Teesside to Filey

Sunday 5 February 2017

General year ticking, Teesside to Filey

A bit of general year ticking today, started up at Teesside at Hartlepool Fish Quay where the juv Glaucous Gull eventually flew in and landed on a roof followed a bit later by the juv Iceland Gull but that appeared to land on the Quayside and out of sight. I thought I’d have another go for the Shore Lark by the Jewish Cemetery next, no sign of that but a pair of Grey Partridge were a bonus, tracking back there was nothing at Jackson’s Landing, the usual Med Gull and Waders were at Newburn Bridge, a good selection of Wildfowl were at Saltholme Pools but no sign of yesterdays White Fronted Geese then on to Redcar where seven Velvet Scoter were on the sea off the cinema and two Snow Buntings showed well behind the Stray Cafe despite all the dogs. The next part of the plan was to head down to Scarborough and I called off at Long Nab on the way where up to 16 Shore Larks had been reported earlier unfortunately they had been flushed by a dog and not seen again, I walked up to the next field but there was no sign, upon my return I came across a couple who were fairly confident they had got them and indeed there was a small flock feeding around 50 yards away but as I went through them with the scope all I could find were Skylarks, I carried on to Scarborough taking in the Peregrines along Marine Drive then as I entered the Harbour my heart sank, the tide was out and as I feared the Harbour was bereft of birds, as I walked out towards the footbridge however I picked up the Great Northern Diver on the left hand side catching crabs as usual and then while looking out into South Bay I got onto one of the Black Necked Grebes swimming back to the Harbour. I finished the day with a quick dash to Filey to search for a Red Necked Grebe reported earlier in the Bay corner, plenty of Great Crested but I couldn’t find the Red Necked, ended up with eight year ticks so not too bad.