best birds: Finding an Arctic Warbler

Finding an Arctic Warbler

I might have complained about the lack of migrant birds on Sunday, especially considering the north-easterly winds, but today I could have nothing to complain about. The north-easterlies continued through Monday and Tuesday and combined with some heavy fog have brought about a massive fall of birds (mainly thrushes, Robins and finches) on the coast. After hearing about so many birds turning up I decided enough was enough and took the rest of the week off to go birding.

Today I headed up to north Norfolk to bird the coastal path between Brancaster Staithe and Brancaster Harbour. I arrived just after dawn to be greeted by a car park full of Redwings, Fieldfare, Song Thrushes and Blackbirds. I walked west towards Brancaster flushing hundreds of thrushes, including lots of Ring Ouzels (at least 20 throughout the morning) and lots of Robins. I stopped at a narrow strand of large willow trees where there was a Chiffchaff and a Common Redstart. Branodunum, the Roman Fort just east of Brancaster was covered in thrushes which flew into the neighbouring hedges when disturbed. I headed back to Brancaster Staithe and stopped to look at a few birds that were flitting around at the top of the large willow trees where I'd seen the Chiffchaff and Redstart earlier. A couple of Goldcrest and a Phyloscopus warbler, which I presumed would be the Chiffchaff, but it wasn't a Chiffchaff - it wasn't a Chiffchaff at all.....

The warbler had a whopping white supercillum and a long (for a warbler) orange bill. It was silvery white underneath and very green above. A massive rush of adrenalin burst into my body as I knew that this was something good. I presumed just on the lateness of the season that it wasn't going to be a Greenish Warbler and anyway, it couldn't be with a super' and bill like that. I frantically tried to get a better view of the bird and double-check it had a wing bar and any markings on the tertials and crown. It was being a real bastard - keeping high up at the back of the tree and moving around a lot. Every time I got a good view of it, it was just the underside. Finally I managed to see that it had a good single wingbar, no crown-stripe and white on the vent. I was fairly sure that it was an Arctic Warbler and after trying to get good views of it, the bird started calling - a short, sharp, metallic "Zzzrip". In fact it called non-stop for about one-and-a-half minutes. I had the Hannu Jannes Arctic Warbler call on my phone and double-checked the call (it's been a few years since I heard Arctic Warbler call). I had the bird calling and the call on my phone going at exactly the same time - stereo! The call matched exactly! I immediately phoned the news out to RBA and within half an hour or so a small crowed had assembled and were watching the bird. It did come a bit lower and showed well on occasions, but it was fairly hard to see most of the time.

I checked out Burnham Deepdale after that. Lots of thrushes again, but nothing rare and then finished the day off with the Red-flanked Bluetail at Stiffkey. A fitting end to such an exciting day.