{"id":1901,"date":"2013-05-14T08:40:49","date_gmt":"2013-05-14T07:40:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/?p=1901"},"modified":"2013-05-14T08:40:49","modified_gmt":"2013-05-14T07:40:49","slug":"north-pennines-birdwatching-130513","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/birdwatching\/north-pennines-birdwatching-130513","title":{"rendered":"North Pennines Birdwatching 13\/05\/13"},"content":{"rendered":"

I collected Andreas ahead of a day of birdwatching in the North Pennines<\/a> with two things in mind; Andreas’ target list for the day (Red Grouse, Black Grouse, Ring Ouzel<\/strong><\/em>) and the weather forecast (sleet and snow showers, temps as low as 7C)…<\/p>\n

Glorious and breezy weather accompanied our journey southwest and we were soon at the first of our regular Black Grouse<\/strong><\/em> sites.\u00a0 We arrived there just ahead of the first of the day’s snow showers – which saw the temperature plummet all the way down to 1C!\u00a0 We soon found our first Red Grouse<\/strong><\/em> of the day, as Curlews<\/strong> <\/em>displayed overhead, and a third of Andreas’ target list had been achieved.\u00a0 An unexpected find by Andreas was a Woodcock<\/strong><\/em>, tucked into the vegetation as we made our way across from Allendale to Weardale.<\/p>\n

\"Eurasian<\/a><\/p>\n

Soon after the Woodcock<\/strong> <\/em>we came across a displaying Common Snipe<\/strong><\/em>, and then our first Black Grouse<\/strong><\/em> of the day; a male sitting on a drystone wall, iridescent blue in the sunshine, followed by this bird, half-heartedly displaying while another one fed close by.\u00a0 Two out of three…<\/p>\n

\"Black<\/a><\/p>\n

Brilliant sunshine was followed by snow, was followed by brilliant sunshine, was followed by snow, and that pattern continued throughout the rest of the day.<\/p>\n

As we headed for our regular lunch spot, Andreas spotted a female Ring Ouzel<\/strong><\/em>, and completed his target list for the day \ud83d\ude42\u00a0 As the sunshine bathed the landscape around us, a very confiding Lapwing<\/strong> <\/em>allowed some easy photography.<\/p>\n

\"Northern<\/a><\/p>\n

After watching two Blackcock<\/strong> <\/em>lekking, with seven other birds pottering about nearby, we headed northeast.\u00a0 The heaviest snow of the day accompanied our journey out of the hills, a reminder that conditions on high ground can be poor at any time…but the reward for braving our remotest landscapes is some really high quality birdwatching.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I collected Andreas ahead of a day of birdwatching in the North Pennines with two things in mind; Andreas’ target list for the day (Red Grouse, Black Grouse, Ring Ouzel) and the weather forecast (sleet and snow showers, temps as low as 7C)… Glorious and breezy weather accompanied our journey southwest and we were soon […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,12,5],"tags":[54,373,172,123,210,208,263,71],"class_list":["post-1901","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-birdwatching","category-pennines","category-northumberland","tag-black-grouse","tag-common-snipe","tag-curlew","tag-lapwing","tag-oystercatcher","tag-red-grouse","tag-ring-ouzel","tag-woodcock"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1901","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1901"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1901\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1905,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1901\/revisions\/1905"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1901"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1901"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.northernexperiencewildlifetours.co.uk\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1901"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}