The Juvenile Birder

A Day For Ducks! We arrived at Upton at 8:00am in hopes of seeing an Iceland Gull; reported as following a plough in a field. We found a large flock of Black-headed Gulls with a few Herring Gulls in it, but after searching through the same flock multiple times, we failed to see our target; so we left and headed to Sanderson's Bank in hopes of seeing a reported Tundra Bean Goose. We got there at 9:20am and before we even parked up, I could see there were both Whooper and Bewick's Swans. I scanned through the Whooper Swans and counted at least 10 Bewick's Swans . They were noticeably smaller than the Whooper Swans and had a lot more black on the bill with a circular, yellow patch by the base. We then found a small flock of Pink-footed Geese so we scanned through them multiple times but again to no avail. We saw that the Ring-necked Duck on Dishley Pool had been reported today, so we set off seeking the American vagrant. We arrived at Dishley Pool at 12:00pm and started t...

A First For Britain!! We arrived at 8:00am at Eyebrook Reservoir (Leicestershire) in hopes of seeing a reported White-rumped Sandpiper. We met someone who let me look through his scope to see it. A lifer for me! It was paler that the Dunlin it was feeding with. It was also slightly smaller and longer than the Dunlin. Soon after, a large raptor hovered for a second above the water. It was an Osprey! It flew around and then went away. He told me it was likely the ones nesting at Rutland Water. The White-rumped Sandpiper kept feeding distantly as we viewed it. Not long after the Osprey, two Red Kites soared in the field behind us, as well as three more feeding in the field opposite us. We then went to Willow Tree Fen in hopes if seeing some Cranes but when we arrived (at 10:50am) it was closed. We waited a bit as it mentioned on Facebook that it was open today. Soon after, a report came in on Rare Bird Alert of a Cape Gull. We found out that it was a first for Britain and lucky for us, we...

Winning An Award and Sighting Badgers!                            (image from internet)                        We arrived at the Global Birdfair (location pinned to post) at 9:00am and at first went to the Swallow Marquee to check out some of the stall there. After that, we went to the BTO Bird Ringing Demonstration and as soon as we arrived, the staff who were ringing were showing everyone an adult female Sparrowhawk and soon after that they showed everyone a Goldcrest and I got a really close view of it. We then moved to a different marquee and met Stephen Menzie at the British Birds stall. We had a good conversation and I learned a lot about ageing, observation and patchworking. We then attended a bird ID competition for young birders at 3:00pm which was hosted by three people including Stephen. After that, we checked out a few more stalls, meeting David L...