I don’t usually do madcap, through the night twitches to jostle for elbow room at first light in cramped hides with scores of grumpy, hairy, ugly men – but for an Asian Plover species I am prepared to become a proper birder for the day. That group of birds holds a special fascination for me and one of it’s number, a White-tailed Lapwing turned up on south Humberside two days ago. This was a must-see.

Being both a local and national mega and the first in Great Britain for 10 years the bird on its first two days attracted huge crowds to the RSPB’s Blacktoft Sands reserve (DN14 8HR – SE843232), and more of the same could be expected today. Tales abounded on social media of long queue’s for limited viewing time in two different hides. All this was tolerantly and well organised by the RSPB in the populist charity’s now more enlightened stance towards those of it’s traditional membership and support who wish to observe particular rare birds.

As things transpired, my twitch leader Mark’s strategy was to get here later in the day by when numbers of people would have subsided and the light might hopefully be better for taking pictures. And after our near seven-hour vigil for the Black-browed Albatross at our first stop, we did not arrive on site until 16:30. Greeted by the reception staff we were at first able to gain brief, unsatisfactory views from there of my day’s second lifer the White-tailed Lapwing (or Plover). The question then was which of two hides to attempt proper observation from.

The bird had commuted through the day between two of the reserve’s six shallow brackish lagoons, in front of the Xerox and Townend hides that are around 350 metres apart. Ewan and Mark reasoned it would be preferable to wait for it to return to the latter where better views might be gained. I joined them at first but before long it seemed sensible to split up and stake out both hides, so I transferred to the Xerox. En route I was told our quest was on view from there but when I walked in it had just moved behind a large, reed-covered island. Ho hum, such is birding.

Feeling a little disgruntled with how things seemed to be turning out I sat down and waited, while enjoying the variety of other waders present – Black-tailed Godwits, Ruff, Greenshank, Common Snipe, Green Sandpiper and a Spotted Redshank. I learned that the star visitor prefers to feed in sheltered locations rather than out in the open. Things did not look good but eventually something flushed more ducks and waders from behind the island. Now on the far side of the lagoon before me, of a sudden and in all its sublime elegance stood the White-tailed Lapwing of my intent. I alerted Ewan then scoped the quite delightful Plover as it moved along the reed edge back towards the island.

This slender and graceful, even dainty looking Lapwing may be described as having rather plain beige upperparts, greyish breast and creamy brown belly; with a pale brown crown, short black bill, large black eyes and strikingly long, bright yellow legs. It breeds in former Soviet central Asia west to Iran and Iraq, and normally winters in the Indian sub-continent and north-east Africa. Very small numbers may migrate to south-eastern Europe.

In it’s home range this is the only Lapwing likely to be seen feeding persistently in deep water or submerging it’s head while doing so. It is rarely found far from the margins of still or slow-flowing water, preferring well vegetated river or canal edges and either saline or fresh water pools rather than open mud flats. By comparison with the familiar Northern Lapwing this distant cousin is rather skulking with a preference for cover. A very scarce vagrant to western Europe, today’s bird is just the seventh ever British record.

I had got lucky today, then my own earlier experience was repeated as my two colleagues arrived just after the bird became lost to view again. So we all settled down and waited for it to emerge from its hiding place once more. Fortunately two Marsh Harriers were active over the reed bed beyond the lagoon and other large birds, Herons and Egrets that might flush waders would fly through the channel behind the island at intervals. Two more instances occurred without the WTL appearing again, so was it still there or had it headed in the other direction?

After another flush that question was answered and our day became complete. Now the White-tailed Lapwing was much closer to the hide than earlier and commenced to go walkabout around the lagoon, offering decent enough picture opportunities in the fading light. But my own camera was ineffective at the distance in those conditions, so I am indebted to my two companions for the images in this post. For the RBA gallery of this bird see here.

It was now early evening and so we set off on the four hour journey home in a contented frame of mind. It had been a very long but ultimately successful day. As a back seat passenger of two real birding “professionals” I had gained two mega life list additions beyond my own preferred twitching range and without the scenario of this post’s opening paragraph that also normally puts me off. My grateful thanks are due to Mark for doing the driving today and to Ewan for inviting me along in the first place. My British bird list now stands at 368, and my western Palearctic list at 509.

There is nothing I can really add to what has already been published online about this bird. So here I will merely recount my own day spent catching up with what is possibly Great Britain’s most popular rarity of 2021. Since his arrival there on 28th June the seasoned Black-browed Albatross commonly known as “Albert” has drawn thousands of admirers, both birders and general public to RSPB Bempton Cliffs in Yorkshire. I have waited for an opportunity to observe him without driving beyond my preferred range, and that came today.

Arriving on-site (TA 197739) at 6am, in company with Ewan and his regular long-distance twitching buddy Mark from Luton, we headed out to the Staple Nook viewpoint. There Albert likes to wile away his time loafing amongst the breeding Gannets before putting on impressive flight displays when the mood takes him. Between them my day’s 500+ British list colleagues have successfully converted almost every new national mega of recent years, including this one twice before, so I had chosen my carriers consciously. On taking up position with something-teen other early birders we learned our quest had flown in to the cliff face around 20 minutes previously, but was now out of sight somewhere below us all.

Cue a wait for the show to commence … quite a time as things transpired. The longest I have ever waited for a bird to take the stage was seven hours for a Baillon’s Crake at Rainham Marsh, Essex in September 2012. Then I concluded that other lifer must have been a female exercising her prerogatives. Being a chap, the reputed half-centurion Albert really ought to have known better. He has not been noted for spending such lazy mornings as today too often, but local birders around me said his routine is never predictable. And so we waited for flight to commence … on and patiently on.

After three hours word came through that Albert was visible on the cliffs from 500 metres or so away to our right, where some birders had picked him out. This being a lifer for me but not my two colleagues, I went over while they stayed behind. I was put onto a rather indistinct grey form nestled amongst the Gannets someway down the sharp top edge from the viewpoint I had vacated, that I was assured was Albert’s back. Eventually this blob raised the white head and pink bill of the Black-browed Albatross I had seen so many images of online, while he alternately dozed and preened. So I thus added this nationally famous mega rarity to my life list … first priority achieved!

Returning to the Staple Nook viewpoint in relaxed mode I then chatted to other birders and friendly volunteer wardens around me, while Albert lazed his time away below and, yes upon checking quite definitely out of sight. Three more hours on at 12:18 the shout at last went up as the BBA got his act together and headed out to sea, landing on the water’s surface. At this stage I was informed by a regular local birder standing nearby this was what he usually does on first taking flight, and he was likely to fly inshore again soon. And so it transpired.

Cue an eventual aerial display that had my trip’s new colleague and ace photographer Mark Rayment enthusing for the rest of the day. Over the next 20 minutes or so Albert performed to his adoring audience like we had all been waiting to see, gliding around and banking on those huge outstretched wings. First out to sea, then close in to the cliff face, out of sight away to the left and around all over again. Since that early arrival here I had been assured this was what the bird would sooner or later do.

Though I will not be entering any of them into competitions, I am frankly astounded at having gained such half-decent images of my own for this post. With my ancient “photographic” artefact these were as usual achieved through altering the basic settings as I went along and hoping for the best. Mark told me the underside studies are the most difficult to achieve, and were the main reason he had wanted to come here again today.

Thus sated the by then hungry and thirsty gathering at Staple Nook mostly dispersed, the three of us included. It being just past midday on a bank holiday weekend, lots of general public who all seemed to know about the Albatross had joined the earlier birders on the cliff top to enjoy his eventual flight spectacular. My own party had a second mission for this day, a mega-rare Asian Plover, White-tailed Lapwing also in Yorkshire around 90 tortuous local driving minutes to the south. And so we went on our way.

Through our seven hour sojourn here we of course had the spectacle of Great Britain’s largest mainland Gannetry to keep us entertained. My best pictures of the morning are presented below. Though the other breeding seabirds have now dispersed, small numbers of Guillemot, Kittiwake and Shag were still active offshore. This was also the first occasion on which I have managed to capture Fulmar pictorially, and at one point two Porpoises swam past.

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For the record, the Black-browed Albatross, whose home range is the oceans of the southern hemisphere, is thought to be the same individual that has wandered the North and Baltic Seas visiting coasts in Germany, Scandinavia and Great Britain since the 1960’s. No spring chicken now, Albert is likewise thought to be the only one of his kind in European waters and might survive for another 15 years into his seventies as this species often does.

If indeed the same bird he first visited Bempton Cliffs in 2014, then again in 2017 and 2020 always briefly, but this summer has been more or less a fixture for almost nine weeks. Though eternally lost throughout his long life to date, he must clearly feel very much at home here and I feel glad to have belatedly made his acquaintance on this day.

The following is presented in all seriousness. Today by way of doing something quite different I enjoyed Oxfordshire’s best fringe wildlife attraction of the moment, the Radley Wasp Spider. This thing of great beauty and mystique was found within a former gravel pit complex (SU520977) six days previously by my wildlife colleague Wayne Bull (see here), then viewed and blogged subsequently by Ewan (see here). So when I ran into the latter at Farmoor Reservoir this morning and he said he was about to have another look, I gladly accepted his invitation to go along too.

This strikingly colourful arachnid, Argiope bruennichi originates from the Mediterranean region and occurs locally through much of central and northern Europe and beyond. It was first recorded in England in 1922, and through the rest of that century mostly from south coast locations. But with more recent global warming there has been a northward range expansion that has attracted some media attention. The name derives from the female of this post’s Wasp like colouring. Males are somewhat smaller and brown so hence less noticeable, even should they survive mating during which they are most often eaten alive.

Well we’ve all known one or two of those, haven’t we chaps? Today we re-located the femme fatale in question quickly, still spread-eagled across her intricate web (pictured above) low down in the vegetation to one side of a track to where my colleague led me. She was busily engaged in cocooning an ensnared fly as some of these pictures show. The large web is termed an “orb web” with an ingenious vertical zigzag pattern running down its centre, known as a stabilimentum that is said to reflect ultra-violet light to attract prey insects.

Females are roughly the same size, between 140 and 180mm long as a larger Garden Spider (Araneus diadematus), that appear in profusion almost everywhere at this time of year. The latter species varies greatly in form but is never black and yellow. The former’s crossways abdomen pattern mimicking the colouration of a wasp is a clever survival mechanism, since predators will mostly leave such stinging insects alone.

The diminutive males are typically between just 4 and 5mm in length and for the reason stated earlier very few remain by this stage of the season. To avoid being consumed sooner they build webs of their own within the edges of the larger one. There they are able to remain undetected until the occupant completes her final moult and reaches sexual maturity, when her jaws will also be softer. Then the intrepid mini-suitors dart in to take their chance but soft jaws or not invariably become a convenient snack once the business is done.

That’s the way to treat ’em, hey chapesses? I am sure there must be more scientific if less entertaining explanations for all this. One is that males of a certain size are able to “plug” the female after mating with their entire bodies to prevent any other male from fertilising her eggs. But perhaps the divas in question might not wish to grant such exclusivity and so tuck in anyway. Maybe it’s time to move on!

Since Wasp Spiders have a particular liking for Grasshoppers as a food item they are rarely found in gardens but more usually unmanaged rough grassland in the countryside. There the web is typically spun in long grass a little above ground level, as with today’s example. Upon a prey item being caught in the web it is immobilised by being wrapped in silk, then bitten and injected with a paralysing venom.

The above picture shows our subject dealing with a newly trapped fly in that way. Being quite pleased with these images I wanted to return with my macro lens and so re-visited in the afternoon with another wildlife colleague, Sally who also wished to see this highly attractive spider. By then the food item was fully cocooned (pictured below), but the morning’s telephoto pictures are probably better. I believe the three of us are the only Oxon birders, other than its finder to take in this alternative local experience so far.

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The subject of this post does not, however always receive such a good press as herein. Cue the DAILY STAR from 9th September 2020:

Hmmm … having now been properly introduced, I have to say I rather like them too. For the record, this similar looking number (above) that I stumbled upon in Morocco in November 2015 is the biggest spider that I myself have ever seen. This lady, as I’m now sure she must have been was the size of my hand … so for “terrified staycationers” her kind could be a further “nemesis divine” were they also to “march across” to these shores. ID anyone?

In its most recent weekly birding round-up: 3 – 9 August, RBA posed the question: “What’s better than an adult Pacific Golden Plover?” Their answer: “Two together at the same site”, was prompted by the arrival on 5th of a second individual at the RSPB’s passage wader mecca of Frampton Marsh at the south-west corner of The Wash. So this seemed an ideal opportunity to add to my bird life list what I had thought of as a tricky Nearctic species and so had not bothered to attempt before.

Pacific and American Golden Plovers were split by the BOURC in 1986, having previously been treated as a single taxon “Lesser Golden Plover”. Since then the former has been an almost annual vagrant to the British Isles, averaging three or four a year, while the latter is a species I have observed just once before in Oxford’s Port Meadow in November 2012. Most British Pacific records occur immediately after the birds leave their breeding grounds in July and early August. These have been well scattered historically, usually on the east-coast, the Northern Isles and in Cornwall.

Two together in breeding plumage (see RBA gallery here) just 125 miles from home, that would not have to be picked out from carrier flocks of European Golden Plover, was therefore the kind of national birding opportunity I seek. In the event this was an easy conversion. Arriving at RSPB Frampton Marsh (PE20 1AY – TF357390) just after 10am it was good to actually be welcomed as a green clad optics carrier in the visitor centre, and I was directed out to the sea wall beyond which the two birds were still present on salt marsh. This sightings board (below) that is also published online was likewise very helpful.

As I walked the main track through the freshwater marsh the exact location was obvious from a small group of people standing atop the embankment. When I got there the first person I enquired of muttered negatively: “Good luck, I haven’t seen it.” But several others were scoping some pools away to the east, and one of them pointed out the area to scan myself. I soon picked out the two Pacific Golden Plover moving up and down the edges of those pools and continued to watch them over the next hour. But I stood little chance of gaining acceptable pictures of my own at that distance looking into the hazy light.

By comparison with European “Goldies” these are smaller and slighter, with a longer neck more easily apparent when alert; a deeper-based, shorter bill and larger-headed appearance. In flight the toes of PGP extend beyond the tail tip and the wings are much slimmer. For an authoritative ID guide to all three GP species see here.

Pacific Golden Plover breed across the Siberian tundra from northern Russia eastward and into western Alaska. The species is highly migratory, with the main wintering range extending through the Indian subcontinent, south-east Asia, southern China and Japan; and across the Pacific islands to Australia and New Zealand. Small numbers also winter in Kenya and the Arabian Gulf, and some in southern California. Departure from the winter quarters takes place from March to early May, and they reach their breeding areas in the first half of June, leaving again in July and early August.

Though they are very similar in appearance, where the breeding grounds of Pacific and American GP overlap in Alaska the two are said to inter-breed only very rarely if at all. The latter species’ migration route is also quite different, with almost all birds wintering in South America. By contrast the wintering range of PGP extends across nearly half of the Earth’s circumference.

Having researched this post and especially found this outsourced image (above) I now realise it must be far less difficult to pick out PGP from carrier flocks than I had previously imagined. So having made the effort this was a day very well spent. This latest gain is items 366 and 507 respectively on my career British and western Palearctic bird lists.

When I was out at the sea wall, the reserve was re-visited briefly by a fly-through Black Stork that had frequented this area of Lincs since 12th, most often at the nearby RSPB reserve of Freiston Shore 6km (in a direct line) to the north-west. In my post-tick exploration of Frampton Marsh (as if I wouldn’t do that?!), I took a route through where the potential British list addition had circled for a time, but it had gone on it’s way. Enquiring at the visitor centre I was told it had last been reported heading north from that other location, so I decided not to chase it before heading home.

The bird did return to Freiston Shore (TF 397423) later in the day and not seeing it rankled slightly through the ensuing week when it was also reported there on most days. So on feeling the need to hit the road again after a seven day mainly dismal weather interval I went for it on Sunday 22nd. Arriving on-site just after 10am I spent four hours making a very long circuit and a half of the marshes there, but the Stork had well and truly gone absent and was not reported anywhere on that date. This at least illustrated how it might also have been a long search for me, without getting lucky eight days previously, but such is birding.

With two of my three latest bird twitches having ended in failure, the other being Western Sandpiper at Snettisham in Norfolk, the time seemed right to do a bit of history instead. At Frampton my attention was caught by the prominent local landmark of St Botolph’s Church tower in Boston that by road lies mid-way between the two RSPB reserves. I now resolved to get closer to and take pictures of the 83 metre structure of what is England’s tallest, non-spired parish church tower, popularly known as the “Boston Stump” (pictured above and below).

The ornate Gothic building dates from 1309 when Boston was a thriving commercial port, England’s second largest at that time. Construction of the tower began in 1452 and was completed by 1520 in the by then popular perpendicular style. The tower is topped with a highly decorated octagonal lantern ringed with pinnacles, one of very few surviving medieval examples in England. Standing at the foot of this magnificent edifice, looking upward and imagining the bygone effort and expertise involved in its construction was to my mind quite awe-inspiring. I have always held an interest in historic buildings and so now include the occasion’s different kind of uplifting experience in this mainly wildlife journal.