As our main hope therefore was maybe a new wader we went to Siblyback Reservoir and Davidstow Airfield yesterday. The Pec Sand that arrived in a group of four earlier in the week was still present at Siblyback but there was no sign of the Buff-breast that was seen yesterday morning. There were a few other bits including Little Ringed Plover, Greenshank, Ringed Plovers and Dunlins and a few Wheatears HERE.
Davidstow had a few waders including Golden Plovers, Dunlin and Ringed Plovers and also a few Wheatears HERE. We had a bit of excitement with a dark and heavily marked Golden Plover that showed some American Golden Plover features but after sharing standing shots with friends and eventually getting a view of the underwing (which showed too much white) we had to conclude that it was indeed a dark juv European Golden Plover.
It was great to be back in Cornwall checking some of our old regular spots when Jaffa and I, Sam, Lee and others were at Plymouth University in the 1990s. It was nice to see Davidstow airfield has not changed and is as surreal as we remembered it with waders running and up and down the old abandoned runways.
Today we checked out Jaffas patch at the Otter Estuary and surrounding area HERE and HERE. Highlights included a juvenile White-tailed Eagle (a bird first recorded in the week which was a first for the site), a migrating Hobby, a bit of vis mig with nearly 80 Mipits west and some nice Cirl Buntings.
A nice little mini trip and great to catch up with Jaffa.
Pec was a world year tick so now on 930 for the year. 70 to go to hit the target!
Juv Pec (images above)
Dark juv European Golden Plover with a more typical one. We discussed the possibilty of introgresion or hyrbids and frequency of dark juv Golden Plovers in the population with Killian who also shared some images of extreme AGP look-a-likes from the Netherlands. Interesting stuff.
Cirl Buntings (above and below)
Juv White-tailed Eagle
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