This single Whooper Swan was found at Little Marlow Gravel Pit on 12th November. This is a good date as other birds have been seen elsewhere over the past few days as they arrive from their breeding grounds. The bird was just sat on the water, calling from time to time. It flew to the other side of the lake when a rather aggressive looking Mute Swan approached it.
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| Whooper Swan |
This Pintail was found feeding in the NW arm of the gravel pit. This is an uncommon visitor to the site.
With a Lapland Bunting showing at extremely close range for a second day at Staines Reservoir,it seemed like too good an opportunity to miss. The bird had been seen towards the eastern end of the causeway, so I approached from that direction and soon met a number of birders who were watching the bird at a range down to 5 metres!
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| Lapland Bunting - Presumably feeding on unseen seeds. |
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| From time to time the bird would flush and often appear in between the fence uprights before returning to feed. |
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| Black-necked Grebes - They were constantly moving about and diving, |
A couple of days after my visit to the Laurel Forest, the whole family (eight of us) hired a yacht and skipper for a trip out of Player de las Americas in search of the Pilot Whales that are resident there. The depth of the sea between Tenerife and La Gomera goes down to over 2000 metres and the Pilot Whales hunt for Squid in the deeper waters.
We reached the area for the Whales after an hours trip and soon picked up a fin in the water. We moved closer and had some good views. After a while we were about to leave the area when Tai, our skipper, saw some more nearby, so we headed towards these and had some fantastic close views.
A video clip of the Pilot Whales. Towards the end there is a larger group swimming past.
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| Apart from the Whales I was also looking for seabirds. I managed to find a few Cory's Shearwaters but all were fairly distant and sat on the water. |
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| Atlantic Yellow-legged Gull - These were very common around the coast and are clearly very similar to the Yellow-legged Gulls that occur from time to time at my local gravel pit. |
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| We had good opportunities for some flight shots after the Whale watching when we moored in a bay for swimming. The Gulls approached very closely for food and would even snatch tit-bits from the hand. |
I spent most of the day birding in the Laurel forest near Erjos in NW Tenerife.
Between the village and the start of the track that led to Monte del Aqua I saw Canary Islands Chiffchaff, Canary, Blue Chaffinch, Blackbird, Raven and heard a Sardinian Warbler.
There is a track that leads to Monte del Aqua and beyond and runs close to the village and leads down through the forest for perhaps 10kM. The birding was extremely hard as the trees lined both sides of the track for much of the way and did not allow long distance views across the forest. The best viewpoint was in fact at Monte del Aqua. |
| The track leading to Monte del Aqua. A fairly typical view but the trees were larger further on. |
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| The Laurel Forest from the track. Most of the forest was on mountainous slopes! |
On entering the Laurel forested area very few birds were seen or heard. Over the next two hours I saw one Laurel Pigeon fairly close for about a minute. The bird flew in and landed about 25 metres away but partly obscured, so I only got a good view of it's head and the front half of the bird. Fortunately it's red eye helped clinch the identification (Bolle's Pigeon has a yellow eye). I was hoping to photograph the bird but it flew before I could get my camera ready. Later I had two other Pigeons fly into the forest fairly close by (ID by their noisy flight) but neither stayed and were unseen. I was hoping to find Bolle's Pigeon, which would have been a life tick but it was not to be.
As I got to a lower altitude the forest changed and a few other bird species were seen. These included Canary, Tenerife Goldcrest and Robin. There were Canary Islands Chiffchaffs along the whole trail. Photography was very difficult and I failed to get any Chiffchaff photos as the birds were usually fairly high in the vegetation and moving around a lot. I did manage to get a few record shots of a Tenerife Goldcrest which are shown below.
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| Tenerife Goldcrest Regulus regulus teneriffae - This is a sub-species of the Goldcrest Regulus regulus and is endemic to Tenerife and the nearby island of La Gomera. |
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| Robin - Taken in the dark understory of the Laurel Forest. A species I get in my garden at home! |
Towards the lower parts of the trail there were exposed rocks on the steep slopes. These attracted some fast moving Lizards.
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| Lizard Species - These were very common. |
After I left the forest, I returned to Playa de las Americas by bus. From the bus station to the hotel was a 10 minute walk and along a fairly quiet road I cam across a Hoopoe feeding on the grass verge. I gradually moved closer and the bird ignored my presence and I managed some nice photos and a video.
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| Hoopoe - As I first saw it. The road on the right did have some vehicles pass by but they did not disturb it. I approached to where the metal drains were in this photo. |
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| The Hoopoe stayed in the shady area. Presumably that is where the food was. |
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| At times the Hoopoe was probing deep into the grass. |
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| A stunning bird! A short video clip of the Hoopoe follows. |
Three Little Grebes seen feeding in the NW corner of the lake. Just before dusk six were seen.
This species is not infrequently seen as an escape or released bird but it is often difficult to be sure if an individual is a truly wild bird. In this case the bird was found at a time when good numbers had just arrived on the east and west coasts of the UK. So it is fairly likely to be of wild origin and had somehow become separated from a flock.
The bird was found by David Ferguson and subsequently seen by a number of local birders. It frequented an area of Sedges to the west of the lake at Fulmer and was often seen feeding.
