A week at the roost 20th - 26th January 2018

Caspian Gull, 2nd winter. 

It might not be the largest roost in the area, but the Pennington Flash gull roost certainly keeps delivering at the moment, though nothing is ever certain. Over the past seven days an amazing 11 species of gull have been present at one time or another, with the 2nd winter Caspian gull the star attraction and drawing the crowds from far and wide.

The Caspian gull has been seen in the roost on four out of the past seven days, and other regular scarcities being recorded are 2nd winter Iceland gull on six out of seven, 3rd winter yellow-legged gull on four out of seven and adult Mediterranean gull on five out of seven.  Two other species have been new into the roost this week and have been single day birds, an adult little gull on Saturday and a 2nd winter kittiwake on Thursday, the latter being a new species at the Flash for me. What's not clear is where the gulls roost when they are not roosting at the Flash.

It's not just about the gulls though, distantly a small starling murmuration of a thousand or two birds is often over Ramsdales reedbed, whilst the usual 800 - 1000 jackdaws swirl around over the gulls. All in all, it's a great experience!

Hooded Crow, a Manchester county mega

Just last week I returned from Cyprus where hooded crows were common town birds, and I barely looked twice at them, so that's my excuse for almost walking past one today without it even registering what it was!

I'd got Elaine to drop me off at the layby near Haydock Island on her way to work. My plan was to walk north up the A49 past the entrance to Haydock Park Race course and then follow a footpath from Heath road down to Sandy Lane and make my way home through Golborne. The reason for doing this was to try to see a reported flock of around 100 brambling which had been seen in that area.

Suddenly as I walked down Heath Road I became aware that I was walking past a hooded crow! It was just there, on the grass about 10m away from me. I really couldn't believe it. There had been one near Haydock Island before Christmas and this was undoubtedly it, but the good news was, this former St Helens mega was now in Greater Manchester!

The light was poor and I fired off a few poor photos and then put the news out, sparking a mini twitch! It turns out that although there are a few records of hooded crow in Greater Manchester, they are from so long ago that virtually every Greater Manchester lister needs it for their list! I didn't see any sign of the brambling.

A strange gull roost

Iceland gull, 2nd winter

A strange gull roost at Pennington Flash this afternoon, for a long time there seemed to be more birders than birds, with 10 scopes looking out over the flash where the only birds present were a handful of very distant large gulls in Ramsdales and 50 or so black-headed gulls coming to bread even more distantly on the car park.

Then at 16:25, and with the centre of the flash still flat calm and devoid of gulls, the fog rolled in and we could see even less and with sunset at 16:28, the afternoon seemed to be over. Miraculously though after a 5 minute white out the fog lifted, and though there were still very few birds compared to some roosts, a flock of a few hundred black-headed gulls and perhaps a couple of hundred large gulls was revealed quite close to us.

Scanning through the flock in what little daylight remained we managed to pick out the 2nd winter Iceland gull, 3rd winter yellow-legged gull, adult Mediterranean gull and best of all my first ever roosting adult winter little gull. Of course I have seen this species at the flash before, usually on early spring passage in March or April, but I've never actually managed to see one in the roost before so a decent night all round. No sign of the now regular Caspian gull, but it may well still be around. Three different species of white winged gull in the same roost, it's a pity that a glaucous gull didn't turn up to complete the set. Surely that really would have been a Pennington Flash record!

Heuglin's Gull, Larnaca, Cyprus

One of the reasons I like to visit Cyprus in the winter is to see perhaps the most enigmatic of all Western Palearctic gulls Heuglin's gull Larus heuglini, also sometimes called Western Siberian or Tundra gull.  There is some argument as to whether or not this bird warrants separate species status or if it is simply another race of lesser black back gull, but whichever way, it's a cracking bird.

Over the past few days I've seen several, all either adults or 3rd winters and I've noticed how variable they can be in both mantle colour and size. I've mentioned previously that 3rd winters always seem to look darker to me, close to Baltic Gull L.f. fuscus, whereas adults look paler more like our western European lesser black-back L.f. graellsii. Apart from some very distant birds at Mandria I've only ever seen quite small looking Heuglin's before yesterday. However I found this adult on the waste water reservoirs at Larnaca yesterday, and it's a monster. Notice the size compared to the nearby Caspians. In the flight photos you can also see the late moult typical of the species. P10 is virtually non-existant and P9 is very small and seems to be just coming through whilst the secondaries are very tatty looking and clearly in the process of moulting. Sorry about the poor quality of the photos, they were taken on my phone, through my telescope using a homemade adapter and on 60x maginification, then cropped. To be honest it's a miracle that they are as good as they are, especially the flight photos.

Caspian Gulls, Larnaca, Cyprus

Living in North West England, Caspian gull is still quite a rarity in my area and I don't get to see very many, so visiting a place like Cyprus where there are lots in winter is a good way to try to get to grips with them. At Larnaca in particular they were very common during my stay there this week, far outnumbering all other big gulls even yellow-legged. The area around Larnaca waste water treatment works and the salt lake at Yialos held at least 300 birds, and there were other smaller flocks at Larnaca salt lake and elsewhere.

Caspian gull is often said to have a distinct jizz, but unless you see a lot of them it's hard to get to grips with this feature. By the end of this short birding break I was at least able to have an appreciation of the jizz of a Caspian, even if it still won't necessarily be obvious in the gull roost at Pennington Flash.

One of the features I noticed of birds in flight was the amazing similarity in jizz to pomarine skua, you can even see this in the photo of the adult above, it's a great big barrel chested bird.

Bits and pieces from around Larnaca, Cyprus

When I'm abroad in sunnier climes, I love seeing species which I wouldn't necessarily expect to see in the Mediterranean but which are common or frequent visitors to the UK.  I suspect that the majority of birders who visit Cyprus don't go for the European white-fronted geese, yet here are five of them feeding on fields near Larnaca airport and occasionally flying onto the water treatment reservoirs.

Lady's Mile and Akrotiri

If you were to ask me my favourite birding site in the whole of Cyprus I would say Lady's Mile on the Akrotiri peninsular, and this is one of the main the reasons why, an adult Armenian gull in winter plumage. What a bird, one of the most beautiful of all of the gulls and this species alone makes winter my favourite season to visit Cyprus. Lady's Mile is a great place to see Armenian gull, and the Oasis Fish Restaurant  right on the pebble beach is an ideal place to see them from. Today there were about 30 Armenian gulls on the water in front of the restaurant, along with a nice selection of Caspian, yellow-legged, slender-billed and black-headed. I've seen some great views of some very special birds today, but this bird was the highlight.

Gull watching at Larnaka

A good day in Cyprus today, I spent it around Larnaca going back and forth between the water treatment reservoirs near the airport, the salt lake and Oroklini Lake. I'm here specifically to look for gulls and especially Great black-headed or Pallas's gull, a species which I have never seen before. I've also never been to Larnaca before, but this is the best place in Cyprus to see Great black-headed and the middle of January is the best time of year. That said, there's usually only one or two records every year and they are sometimes only present for a few minutes before moving on, so it's at best a longshot. However if you stay at home and don't try then you definitely won't see one, so here I am.

No sign of great black-headed gull today, but at least 4 Heuglin's (Siberian) gulls (2 ads, 2 3cy and a possible 1cy), about 300 Caspian, many yellow-legged and several Armenian. They don't seem as easy to get close to here as they are at Lady's Mile near Limassol, but still not too bad when compared to the gull roost at Pennington Flash! Also the gull flocks seem to be dominated by Caspian here, whereas in previous winters I've seen more Armenian at Lady's Mile and just a few Caspian. I'm heading for Lady's Mile tomorrow so it will be interesting to see if history repeats itself.

Obviously I'm also seeing plenty of other birds, notably around 500 greater flamingos, 11 ferruginous ducks, a few laughing doves, loads of Kentish plover, a single flock of 61 black-necked grebes (!), red-crested pochards, a good variety of waders and plenty of chiffchaffs of the race brevirostris. The remarkable story of how I discovered that this was overwhelmingly the race which overwinters on Cyprus when it was previously thought to have never been recorded on the island is told here. 

Dipper, Westleigh brook, Pennington Flash

Dipper

A dipper on Westleigh brook, between the bypass and the bridge nearest Leigh college  may possibly be one of the two birds which were present in the latter part of last year, but if so it's done a pretty good job of hiding itself away for the past two or three months.

Caspian Gull, Pennington Flash gull roost

Caspian Gull

Day after day of doing the gull roost and a long day at the flash today in the freezing cold was finally rewarded with this fantastic bird...... and I saw it as well!

I was out and about on a non-birding mission when I got the call from John Tymon to inform me that he had found a 2nd winter Caspian gull in the roost from Green Lane at Pennington Flash. It was 16:15, nearly ten minutes past sunset. Could I get there, what chance did I have?? Only one way to find out, I set off for Green Lane, but no time to go home for the binoculars or the telescope, I didn't even have my coat, my hat or my gloves. All I had was enthusiasm and hope.

I pulled up alongside John, who thankfully was still there and he let me view the bird through his scope and take these few photos. Only at that point did I realise how cold it was and I decided that I'd done all that I could so I got back in the car and headed home. The light had completely gone, I had no optics, I had no warm clothing.

This is only the second ever Caspian gull at the flash, both found by John and both also seen by me!  It's clearly a different bird to the first which we saw just before Christmas, because unlike todays bird the first had a glaucous gull like bill, pink with a black tip.