30 Oct 19

Priorslee Lake and The Flash

Priorslee Lake:  05:40 –09:10
The Flash:  09:15 – 10:25

4.0°C > 7.0°C:  A few areas of very low cloud pre-dawn; otherwise clear, though with: high cloud encroaching from the south. Slight ground frost. Light E wind. Very good visibility.

Sunrise: 07:02 GMT

Priorslee Lake:  05:40 –09:10

(257th visit of the year)

Most surprising bird today was a male Pheasant in the small copse at the S end of the dam. This species is often noisy and active around the area in Spring but otherwise I rarely see one here.

Busy overhead initially, though movement soon faded.

Bird notes from today:
- No Mallard until a trio flew in at 08:50. Probably the roosting birds left before I arrived.
- Now three Pochard.
- Only 10 Great Crested Grebes located. Six, at least, of these immatures.
- The migrant Wood Pigeons rather half-hearted today. No large groups and local birds flying up to join passing groups did not seem to climb to full ‘migrating altitude’.
- Jackdaws behaved unusually. At the normal passage time some 75 birds were logged, all in groups of no more than seven. A party of 118 birds flew over at the late time of 08:05 – some 90 minutes later than usual at this time of year. Even more small groups followed.
- The first Starlings to leave the roost area were nine singles from various locations at the same time. It was nearly 10 minutes before large groups started leaving.

Bird totals:

Birds noted flying over or flying near the lake:
- 4 Black-headed Gulls
- 26 Lesser Black-backed Gulls: mainly adults
- 10 Feral Pigeons (2 groups)
- 101 Wood Pigeons: 66 of these in nine small migrant groups heading ‘SW’
- 221 Jackdaws
- 1 Rook
- 1 Skylark
- 71 Starlings (8 groups)
- 8 Fieldfares (3 groups)
- 119 Redwings (6 groups)
- >10 Pied Wagtails
- 1 Lesser Redpoll

Birds logged leaving roosts around the lake:
- >230 Starlings
- 3 Redwings again
- 12 Reed Buntings

Counts from the lake area:
- 2 + 5 (1 brood) Mute Swans
- 5 (3♂) Gadwall
- 3 (2♂) Mallard
- 3 (2♂) Pochard
- 52 (28?♂) Tufted Ducks
- 1 Cormorant yet again
- 2 Grey Herons
- 3 Little Grebes
- 10 Great Crested Grebes only
- 7 Moorhens
- 141 Coots
- 42 Black-headed Gulls
- 51 Lesser Black-backed Gulls
- 1 Herring Gull: first-winter bird
- 1 Yellow-legged Gull: first-winter
- 1 Kingfisher again

Lamp poles just frosted pre-dawn and revealed:
- 3 November Moth-types (Epirrita sp.)
- 2 Dicranopalpus ramosus harvestmen
- 2 Paroligolophus agrestis harvestmen
- 1 Leiobunum blackwalli harvestman
- 1 unidentified gnat sp.

No later sightings

The next stage in the cygnets flying lesson is landing. Take off is optional: landing is mandatory.

Marks out of 10? Nine I would say.

A drake Gadwall looking coy. Actually it is just taking a pause in its preening. Its partner is still digging it.

Apropos my comment yesterday about the white patches in the leading edge of Grey Heron’s wings: they are not at all obvious here. “My: what big feet you have”

Gull puzzle #1. The wings suggest that this is a first-winter Lesser Black-backed Gull. But why is the upper-tail so heavily marked? No idea. The only gull that seems to match this is the Slaty-backed Gull of East Asia and that has never been recorded in Europe. Probably just an aberrant Lesser Black-backed Gull.

Gull puzzle #2. An immature gull with a white-looking head, a very black-looking bill and some pale in the inner primaries. The upper-tail looks almost grey here and relatively unmarked.

Here we see a hint of brown at the very base of the bill.

A flap after a bit of a bathe.

Confirms the upper tail is not well-marked.

Here from behind, wings spread.

Subsequent discussion on Twitter about photos taken by others of this bird here have re-identified it as a first-winter Caspian Gull. The bill structure, the clean white head with no dark eye smudging, and the pale underwing all point to this species.

I know all about formation flying: but with airliners? In reality these two were vertically separated by 5000’ feet – a mile away. If you are interested the one on the bottom left is a Boeing 787-900 Dreamliner of United Airlines flying from Denver to Paris Charles de Gaulle. And the one on the right is a Boeing 767-300 also of United Airlines and going to Paris but from Chicago. About an hour later would not be a good time to be at French immigration.

(Ed Wilson)

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The Flash:  09:15 – 10:25

(243rd visit of the year)

Highlight today was a splendid drake Goldeneye. My first Goldeneye here since 02 December 2017. Bird species #82 here this year

Other notes from here:
- The Sparrowhawks were being seen off by Carrion Crows, as often happens.
- One of the three Common Buzzards was being ‘helped’ away by the other two.
- A Pied Wagtail was on a house-roof briefly.

Bird noted flying over / near The Flash:
- 2 Cormorants
- 2 Sparrowhawks
- 3 Common Buzzards
- 2 Lesser Black-backed Gulls
- 2 Wood Pigeons
- 7 Jackdaws
- 1 Skylark
- 9 Starlings
- 26 Redwings (1 group)

Counts from the water:
- 3 Mute Swans
- 21 Canada Geese
- 1 Feral / hybrid-type goose
- 30 (17♂) Mallard
- 1 (1♂) Pochard still
- 41 (>14♂) Tufted Duck
- 1 (1♂) Goldeneye
- 5 (2♂) Goosander
- 3 Great Crested Grebes
- 3 Moorhens
- 12 Coots again
- 16 Black-headed Gulls

Other things:
- on the usual lamp pole
        - 1 Dicranopalpus ramosus harvestman
- on lamp poles in squirrel alley
- 1 November Moth-type (Epirrita sp.): same place as yesterday
- elsewhere on lamp poles
- 1 November Moth-types (Epirrita sp.): also same place as yesterday
- on the bank of Ivy: hazy sun and chill wind so low count
        - c.10 wasps
        - very few flies
- and
        large number of toadstools on long-fallen tree trunk. Probably Mycena archangeliana or Angel’s Bonnet

The drake Pochard is still sleeping it off. This species is primarily a nocturnal feeder – diving for weed growing from the bottom of lakes and ponds. So resting during the day is not necessarily a sign of sloth.

As the wind blew he rotated slowly. Note he has just about got an eye open to check what is going on.

As the days go by sexing of Tufted Ducks is getting easier – they are moulting in to adult plumage. This is an obvious drake with the white flanks. He seems to need a touch of ‘Grecian 2000’ on the ‘tuft’.

This is not too hard either – plenty of white in the flanks. Not much ‘tuft’ though – perhaps a first-year bird.

This one too has white emerging to cover up the browner winter flank-markings. Looks as if he is smirking about something.

How about this one? Not at the best angle but I think a duck

The star of the morning. A Goldeneye: and a splendid drake at that. The unique head shape is clear as is the stunning white face patch which this species only shares with Barrow’s Goldeneye of Alaska and in that species the white is crescent-shaped. A real ‘golden eye’.

Here he is again with different lighting.

A common result when photographing Goldeneye!

From the paths at The Flash it is hard to avoid strong contrast on ducks in the middle of the water – many like to be as far away from the edges as possible. Two drake Goosanders with their bottle-green heads attend to their feathers. Note the very bright feet on this species.

Having a good preen. Obvious drakes are generally much less common at this time of year as youngsters have yet to moult in to adult plumage.

This mass of toadstools has suddenly emerged on a long-fallen tree-trunk, rotting away.

Where are the fairies then?

And from underneath we see the gills. I am certain this is a Bonnet fungus from the genus Mycena. My vote would be for M. archangeliana or Angel’s Bonnet in which case we should be looking for angels and not fairies to be dancing around.

(Ed Wilson)

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On this day..........

2018
Priorslee Lake
Today's Sightings Here

2015
Priorslee Lake
Today's Sightings Here

2014
Priorslee Lake
Today's Sightings Here

2010
Priorslee Lake
10 Swans
c.60 Golden Plover
c.200 Starlings left a roost in the reeds at the W end
763 Wood Pigeons
3 Skylarks
7 Meadow Pipits
165 Fieldfare
9 Redwings
4 Siskins
3 Linnets
1 Redpoll
(Ed Wilson)

2009
Priorslee Lake
8 Wigeon
20 Pochard
(John Isherwood)

The Flash
1 Goosander
1 Teal
(John Isherwood)

2006
Priorslee Lake
100 Jackdaw
130 Rooks
1 Buzzard
Kestrel
c.60 Golden Plover
(Martin Adlam)

2005
Priorslee Lake
450 to 500 Starlings left the roost
11 Pochard
47 Tufted Duck
Pair of Ruddy Duck
200+ Coot
1 Dunlin
104 Lesser Black-backed Gulls
100 Black-headed Gulls
Kingfisher
A Buzzard was seen feeding on earthworms and possibly beetles
2000+ Wood Pigeon
62 Redwing
54 Fieldfare
3 Song Thrushes 
(Martin Adlam)