Northern Experience Wildlife Tours

Tag: Sandwich Tern

  • Landscape photography and birdwatching on the Northumberland coast

    This has been one of our busiest weeks since we started NEWT, and I’ve only just got around to finding the time to sit in our office and blog about the last few days.

    Tuesday saw Mike, one of our returning clients, coming for his second day out with NEWT, including some photography tuition in the Northumberland Coast AONB and a birdwatching trip across to the Farne Islands.

    After a session on exposure theory, covering topics such as exposure values, ND filters and average metering (the bane of photographers everywhere) and a bit of practice with slow shutter speeds to creatively blur the rising tide it was time to head across to Inner Farne.

    No matter how many times I visit the Farne Islands, I’m always awestruck by just how good the experience is;  Grey Seals, Common, Sandwich and Arctic Terns, Eiders, Kittiwakes, Fulmars, Guillemots, Puffins and Razorbills all offer excellent photo opportunities so plenty of memory cards are a must.

    Common Guillemots (including a 'bridled' Guillemot) after a successful fishing trip
    Razorbills

  • The dawning of the “season”

    After a cold, wet day surveying one of our inland tetrads for the Bird Atlas, we had a very early start on Sunday for our Dawn Chorus walk at Lee Moor Farm.  Ian was, as always, an entertaining host for the event and we walked around the farm, enjoying the songs of Willow Warbler, Song Thrush and Sedge Warbler, excellent views of Brown Hare and Roe Deer and then a delicious breakfast.  Our next event at Lee Moor is a bat walk, moth trapping demonstration and BBQ on Saturday May 15th.

    Monday saw us out on Atlas work again, this time much closer to home as we are covering the tetrads that are immediately north and south of our house.  The highlight was a reeling Grasshopper Warbler, and the closest Tree Sparrows to home that we’ve found so far.

    Yesterday was our first Farne Islands Safari of the year.  With excellent views of Sandwich, Common and Arctic terns, Eiders, Guillemots, Razorbills, Puffins, Shags, Gannets, a very obliging Wheatear and Grey Seals it was everything we would expect the Farnes to be.  There’s a good reason that the islands will be the venue for days out with 3 of our photography clients over the next few weeks.

    Now, it’s Wednesday morning and I’m just packing the Landy ready for a migrant hunt on Lindisfarne with 2 of our returning clients.  Wish us luck 🙂

  • On the beach

    Our monthly WeBS count should have been done a couple of weeks ago although, with weekends from mid-March through to mid-September fairly well occupied, this morning was the first chance I’d had to do the count.  With today’s tide times, and a mid-morning meeting with a potential sponsor for NEWT, I left the house just after 6am and drove to Cresswell.  Our usual method of covering the 3.75 miles of our survey section is to take 2 cars, leave one at East Chevington and then drive to Cresswell in the other, leaving us with a walk north along Druridge Bay.  As a solo survey it’s a 7.5 mile round journey, and good exercise on the sand.  As I headed north on a deserted beach, the southwesterly wind brought icy, stinging rain.  Nearly 100 Common Eiders were just offshore, 5 Common Scoter were just beyond them and a summer-plumaged Red-throated Diver brought a splash of colour.  A Sand eel had managed to become stranded almost 20m above the receding tideline so I did my good deed for the day and returned it to the sea, although it initially resisted my efforts to pick it up 🙂  Sandwich Terns were flying backwards and forwards along the shore, giving their creaky, rasping call, and a summer-plumaged Sanderling was feeding alongside 2 Ringed Plovers.

    With legs stretched and lungs filled with clean sea air I finished my walk and headed home.  All the while I was thinking about my early birdwatching days when I would get up before dawn and cycle to what I’d identified as promising local birdwatching spots.  Sometimes they produced the goods, sometimes they didn’t…but there was always that sense of having the world to yourself.  Sometimes, birdwatching in Northumberland can feel like that in the middle of the day 🙂