Thursday, 26 October 2023

Corvo Day Five- Epic Day !

Today will live long in mine and David's memory as one of the best days we've had on Corvo in nearly twenty years. We started off doing the lower fields around the village and apart from the long staying Yellow Crowned Night Heron is was rather disappointing as we were expecting to find new birds in the now calmer and dryer conditions after the recent storms. 

After coffee, a bit de-motivated we set off to the reservoir as the fog had cleared today and nobody had been up there for a few days. As we pulled into the reservoir road a Swainson's Thrush was feeding on the road so at last we had found a new bird. Over the next rather insane two hours we found a Grey Catbird feeding along a wall (only the 2nd for the Azores and 10th for the WP) a Philadelphia Vireo, a Buff-breasted Sandpiper, American Golden Plover, 3 White-rumped Sandpipers, 7 Snow Bunting and we beheld the very odd sight of a Surf Scoter flying around the fields and attempting to land in the large water tanks. 

Needless to say we were completely buzzing so decided to try Tennessee Valley and had a Red-eyed and a White-eyed Vireo (presumably the WEV was the long staying bird).

We finally got back to the village and I moved into my new accommodation (I couldn't stand it any longer sleeping on the ant infested kitchen floor of our old tiny house in the village with David snoring too so have now got my own Bungalow). As I was moving in and talking to the family on the phone David decided to have a look in the Bungalow garden and found a blinking Blackpoll Warbler!

So basically an absolutely epic day! Live Ebird Trip Report HERE 

Grey Catbird (above and below) - found by David who was standing next to me screaming Catbird! A mind-blowing bird. 

White-eyed Vireo- seems like this presumed first-winter has already developed it's white eye (at least some of the ones we have seen here in the past had dark eyes) 
Philadelphia Vireo
Red-eyed Vireo 
Blackpoll Warbler
Swainson's Thrush- I think we've seen 9 of these now 
Not what we were expecting to see flying around the fields- Surf Scoter 

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