Birding insanity in Lancashire

It's now just over three weeks since I saw Lancashire's belted kingfisher at my first attempt. I just turned up at Redscar wood on the banks of the Ribble and after a scramble down a slippy bank got onto the bird immediately and watched it for about the next hour as it perched in various trees and bushes and flew around calling. Fabulous views of a fabulous bird and a great experience. 

Twenty three days later and the slippy bank now seems the easy bit, the hard bit is the bird actually being present in the first place. I've tried to see it again on another six occasions and discounting an incredibly brief possible sighting of the bird on 7th December, I've failed every time.  Not that anybody else is seeing it, all three sightings recently on the Leeds / Liverpool canal have been by non-birders. However one of them took a photo of the bird and there is no doubt that it is the belted kingfisher.

So I just keep looking, I'd go again tomorrow if I could get away with it but Elaine already thinks I'm insane. I'll wait until she's distracted by work on Monday and slip away again for another search. I'm sure that when I do see it the experience will be so much the better for all of the pain I've endured recently.

Perhaps I am insane. Eight days ago I connected with the Richardson's cackling goose at Banks marsh on my first attempt. It was a little distant but it was a decent enough view of the bird, as good as anybody else is getting. Since then I have tried and failed another four times to see the bird again. Banks marsh is rarely easy, I must have carried my scope 20 miles this week in my search for the bird, and spent hours scanning through flocks of geese nearly a mile distant, usually in either dull murky conditions or with moderately strong winds shaking the tripod making viewing almost impossible, all to no avail. 

So despite seeing both of these special birds so well at the first attempt, I've subsequently spent a total of 10 days looking for them again and failed every time. I'll keep trying though, with as much enthusiasm as I had on the first day. 

Let's be honest though, with views like this it's not been a complete waste of time. I have seen common kingfishers and goosander on the canal, and the scenery has been lovely. Meanwhile at Banks the search has produced hen and marsh harriers, peregrines, merlin, short-eared owls and great white egrets and an overall wonderful wildfowl spectacle. I can think of worse ways to spend my days. I've thought of a name for it. It's called birding.