Not waving but not quite drowning

A planned quiet morning in the village has produced Great Shearwater and a near death experience with an Atlantic roller whilst recovering a recently deceased Cory's Shearwater,... so not that quiet really.  Currently in my second set of clothes for the day,... slightly moist in the pant region.

Common Blackbird, Turdus merula azorensis, Melro-preto.

Feral Rock Dove, Columba livia volorattus, Pombo-das-rochas.

Cute ickle kid, Capra aegagrus cuteasabuttonicus, Cabrito.

This afternoon a dose of new birds arrived and brought the weather with them.

1st-winter female Northern Parula in the murk. 

59th-winter male birder in the murk.

Now in my third set of clothes,... still slightly moist in the pant region. 

Mammal gets Bird of the Day

Heard the Dickcissel this morning whilst sorting through the hoards of Canary and House Sparrow in the village fields; then had a flyover Buff-bellied Pipit and a Bryde's/Sei Whale. Unfortunately, the rest of the day went to hell in a hand-cart due to a report of a 'warbler sp.' in Da Ponte. Four hours in a valley and a long walk home.

Bryde's/Sei Whale passing east just of the south coast of Corvo.

[Addendum: a comment regarding the above from Justin Hart via Peter "A few [Sei Whales] have passed by Pico in the last couple of weeks (and a Humpback yesterday too). Could be a Bryde's but it's getting late in the year for these warm water species and they're much more rare. My money is on Sei whale on return migration to warmer waters. we see alot more baleens in spring but I guess more people are looking then."]

The Buff-bellied Pipit which flew over Pete and I on its way to Flores.

Headless chicken

Up to the reservoir first thing, visibility down to about 10 metres and Solitary Sand and White-rumped Sands down to three metres. Then started yomping down to drop out of the fog only for news of a Dickcissel in the village to quicken our pace (run number one for the day).

Dickcissel, Dickcissel, Dickcissel.

Then lunch was interrupted by Ernie relocating the Tennessee Warbler (second run of the day), unfortunately, the bastard thing had disappeared into the boundless, wind-whipped Tamarisks before I rocked up. The only thing I bumped into coming the other way as I fought my way through the jungle was this,...

The wrong sort of vireo.

Then the news of a Philadelphia Vireo (one of the right sort of vireos) filtered through from Da Ponte and its time for the third run of the day only to end up in yet more wind lashed habo,... another dip. The plan to potter back was then royally buggered when Eric refound the Tennessee in the village and, yes, I'm running again, only to take the wrong track and miss tickable views by seconds.

It is at this point when I dropped a C-bomb so large it rendered half of Villa do Novo an uninhabitable waste. Half the population is now homeless, wandering through the rubble, in wide-eyed shock.

Then the bird reappeared, more scrambling and it finally fell. Two mega ticks in a day, the Philly can wait until tomorrow. Nice.

White-rumped Sandpiper poo. One for the Wildlife Photographer of the Year Competition.

Clucking hell

Just missed out on a Tennessee Warbler, bumping into Rose-breasted Grosbeak and Indigo Bunting in the process did nothing to take the edge off, so you can all cluck off.

A decidedly less quiet one

Four and a half hours in the wind and rain, worth every minute,...

 Regular appearances by a Black-and-White Warbler and a Cliff Swallow also helped the hours pass.

Wait till you see Vincent's images.

A quiet one

Spent all morning in Agua for very little reward and the most cursory of looks for the Blackpoll Warbler produced a predictable blank. All in all a bit quiet,... apart from the intra-local stabbing last night, Hannu impaling his leg and a possible hernia but I'll tell you about those another time. 

[Addendum: I forgot to mention, we also have a high(ish) profile member of the UK birding community living the life of a shadowy ne'er-do-well, climbing in windows, only walking the village streets after dark, hiding under the bed on every knock at the door, etc. I don't know, the things that happen on a rock in the middle of the sea.]

Magnolia falls

Unfortunately, our morning's birding produced nothing more than 2-3 Indigo Buntings and a Red-eyed Vireo. Fortunately, Gordon's morning turned up a Magnolia Warbler and we all piled into Da Ponte to bask in its lovely jubbliness. Unfortunately, its jubbliness did not extend to it being easy to photograph, hence the complete lack of associated imagery. Fortunately, my miserable failure is, potentially, your gain as it gives you a great excuse to check out Vincent's site here. Vincent, for those who don't know, is our photographic automaton, a pinnacle of modern design, a seamless fusion of man and camera. We simply point him at a bird then stand back and admire the single-minded, faultless efficiency,... and all fueled on coke, chicken and chips.

Popped up the reservoir this afternoon where everything was much the more amenable regarding photography as you can see,...

Halfway through papping this Solitary Sandpiper I leant back on the cattle fencing and received a rather unnecessary administration of a silly number of volts. Squealed. Like. A. Girl.

White-rumped Sandpiper, still outnumbering everything else but, on this occasion, also accompanied by the Solitary Sandpiper, a Pectoral Sandpiper and a Semi-palmated Plover.

An additional buy two get one free example of Corvo magic just for you,...

A bush and a bird.

Three minutes thirty-one seconds later, same bush, different bird. Groovy huh?

Across the ribeira and into the trees

A very quick update as I'm starving and dinner calls,...

First full day on Corvo, first two hours in a ribeira and look what I found.

Another smarty on the WP finds list.

Will add more detail later,... probably. Stay tuned folks!

[Addendum: never did get round to scribing a 'finder's account'. Well, it went like this,... looked up, there it was, I said "Wood Thrush!" (because that's what it was). A small amount of hell broke loose. Le fin.]

Gentle little warm-up

A short morning pottering on Sao Miguel produced 15+ Whimbrel, a Knot and a Bar-tailed Godwit at the airport; and four Semi-palmated Plover plus a smattering of White-rumped Sandpiper at Mosteiros.

Following arrival on Corvo a quick scoot up the road resulted in two (count 'em) Azores ticks in a mini hirundine flock consisting of four Cliff Swallow and four House Martin.

Then it was into the fields to be stalked at every turn by the hordes of feral cats, until...

... on rounding a corner we stumbled on an excited Finn watching a Northern Waterthrush in a puddle. Jubbly.

[Addendum: There seems to be some discussion over the identification of this Northern Waterthrush, I'd guess largely due to the high ISO, slightly over-exposed, noise-reduced-to-hell-and-back jpeg posted by Peter here. Not having Pyle to hand (I know, I know, I forgot to pack it), the following is heavily indebted to 'Separating Louisiana and Northern Waterthrushes' c/o Belltower Birding.

Our bird showed the following features:

• a plain up-and-down bobbing of the tail and rear body; 
• a yellowish supercilium (paler, whitish behind the eye), breadth of supercilium behind the eye varied with posture; 
• thin bill with thin and straight lower mandible; 
• a finely striped chin (this was lost' in Peter's photograph due to slight over-exposure); 
• yellowish breast and belly, whiter on the rear flanks and undertail (the yellow was reduced in Peter's photo probably as a result of increasing the contrast in the image and noise-reduction); 
• quite dense streaking on the underparts; and
• short primary projection. 

All the above seem to lean towards Northern,... granted the legs were quite pink though.]

Another god awful heavily cropped image for your delectation.

Just a little teaser

Will add a few more photos later but, in the mean time,...

Sao Miguel: Three Semi-palmated Plovers, 23 White-rumped Sandpipers, a Semi-palmated Sandpiper and a couple of Roseate Tern at Mosteiros; a flock of ten American Golden Plover with five, disappointingly white-rumped, Whimbrel plus three flyover Grey Plover just west of Calhetas; and a Spoonbill roosting in the harbour at Ponta Delgada.

Aaand a few more photos,...

The only adult amongst the White-rumped Sandpiper flock at Mosteiros today.

One of the many juveniles/1st-winters.

There's very little not to like about these Semi-palmated sweeties.

The American Golden Plover flock Peter and I found in a random field just west of Calhetas.