Bempton

Gannets

The East coast has been filled with wonders so I thought I'd use up one of my free return tickets on a trip out to Bempton. For the third night running I set my alarm clock, today I didn't switch it off, groan and say: "Conkers!" The Met Office promised a cool, dry lunchtime, a bracing Nor' nor' Easter and light rain in the afternoon.

I've been sniffy about Yorkshire's provision of wayside birds, today it was in a giving mood with an abundance of birdlife in the fields as we passed by. Mostly woodpigeons, carrion crows and jackdaws with odd flocks of rooks and black-headed gulls, here and there a couple of pheasants or a buzzard and every so often a roe deer would trot across a field of rough pasture. For once there were ducks on the small waterways — all mallards — but the Ouse and the Humber were, as usual, deserts. 

About halfway between Scorborough and Watton I noticed a mini-digger at work on a land drain by the line. It was accompanied by ten little egrets which seemed to have regarded it as a large and noisy animal of some kind providing a convenient supply of large lumps of food-filled mud.

The weather wasn't bad when I arrived at Bempton. The sun shone weakly through the clouds and it was quite mild despite the wind. Rooks and jackdaws made a racket in the trees by the road and moorhens fossicked round the village pond.

Walking to Bempton Cliffs 

I walked out of the village and up to Bempton Cliffs, checking out the hedgerows along the way and scanning through the flocks in the fields just in case. There were large flocks of woodpigeons, starlings and jackdaws, the pigeons and the handful of stock doves tended to be skittish, one field was thickly carpeted with black-headed gulls and herring gulls. Robins and wrens sang in the hedgerows, linnets and goldfinches skittered about and a mixed flock of house sparrows and tree sparrows had me confused for a couple of minutes.

Blackbird

The Dell

Arriving at Bempton Cliffs I had a look at The Dell, the densely wooded hollow just before the car park. There'd been wood warblers, an Arctic warbler and a possible Eastern crowned leaf warbler together with a couple of yellow-browed warblers yesterday. I'd settle for any of them. There were plenty of tree sparrows bouncing about, a few blackbirds were feeding in the hawthorns. I could hear a chaffinch but took a while to find it, the chiffchaff that was calling kept under cover. A red admiral basked in what little sun was available. I couldn't find any other warblers here so I had a nosy round the trees in the car park and had no more success there. I was told I was half an hour late for a Siberian chiffchaff.

Bempton Cliffs 

I decided to go for a walk by the cliffs while the weather was behaving itself then come back for a second look at The Dell. Weather permitting I could give it an hour's intensive staring at before I'd have to go for the train home.

Pigeons
Most are of the rock dove type but you can see a few domestic variations in there.

Gannets

The cliffs were heaving with gannets, pigeons and jackdaws. There were still some young gannets on nests. Most of them were exercising their wings ready for their first flight, there were a few nests still with fluffy black young. All the auks and kittiwakes had gone and I only saw the one fulmar. I did a bit of seawatching, the few birds that weren't gannets were herring gulls.

Gannets

Gannet

Gannet

Gannet
The problem was that if a gannet was likely to get close enough not to get reduced to soft focus in the mist it was also likely to stall, bank or otherwise jink out of the frame as the photo got taken. I have a lot of "There was a gannet there a moment ago" photos.

Gannet

Gannet

Gannets

Gannets

Gannet and full-grown chick

Gannets, including a chick lower right

It started raining as I walked back to the visitor centre for a call of nature. As I went in a chap told me there was a long-eared owl in The Dell. I did the necessary and headed over as quickly as possible.

Walking back to the visitor centre 

Bempton Cliffs 

It had started raining in earnest and the anticipated crowd of birdwatchers wasn't there. I scanned round without much hope of seeing the owl and was joined by a couple of other people. Tree sparrows and a great tit muttered from deep cover, woodpigeons sidled into the tree canopies. I heard the chiffchaff again and then heard the sad bullfinch-like call of a Siberian chiffchaff. I was trying to find that when I noticed an eye staring out of the depths of a hawthorn. Luckily the wind was thrashing all the foliage about so I also got to see the full face and half the body of a long-eared owl, a lifer for me. I tried to put the others onto it but the visibility was appalling and my binoculars were starting to steam up then I made the mistake of moving round to see if I could get a better view of the owl and lost it completely. In the end I had to admit defeat and wished them the best of luck.

I set off for the station and hadn't gone far before a kind soul pulled up his car and asked if I wanted a lift. I'm not too proud to say thank you very much and jump into the car before he changed his mind.

The gent dropped me off at the station in plenty of time for the train before the one I was aiming for. I considered getting off at Bridlington for a nosy round the harbour but common sense prevailed and I stayed on the train to Sheffield. 

The rain only slightly dampened the birdwatching. There was even a black-headed gull on the Humber. As the train passed Brough Haven we had a close encounter with a ringtail hen harrier that was hunting over a field by the trackside as a skein of greylags passed overhead. Passing over the Ouse near Goole the train spooked a flock of thirty-odd black-tailed godwits.

The train back to Manchester from Sheffield was twenty-two minutes late. Standing in the cold and driving rain I was astonished to see two red admirals flying into the wind along the track. Tough little buggers.

The rain abated once we got into Derbyshire and there were hints of sun in the Hope Valley. The sun must have set sometime as we arrived into Manchester but it was more of a fade into darker grey. Rather despite the weather it had been a good day's birdwatching and I got myself another lifer.

Bempton Cliffs