Paul Matson's Birding Blog: Monday 13th September

When news of a Black-browed Albatross broke in June of a bird visiting the Gannet colony on Bempton Cliffs, it was the week I was away in Cambridge and wasn't possible to engineer a visit. Previous UK records have either been from the Northern Scottish Islands or brief lucky fly-pasts from various coastal locations, so a reasonably settled mainland bird was going to have significant attractions for such a great bird. It's continued presence in the following couple of weeks into July, coincided with me being laid low with a bug for 10 days which was the time when most birding friends made their visit, again I couldn't go. It then became a little erratic for several weeks where it would disappear for days at a time, making the commitment to a 5 hour drive more challenging with the uncertainty that prevailed and I was frequently thinking oh well that's one that got away. In recent weeks the Albatross has still been sighted and East Yorkshire added to the temptation with an equally rare White-tailed Lapwing, looking fairly settled at Blacktoft Sands RSPB, and then last Friday, astonishingly, another rarity, a Green Warbler, being found next to Bempton Cliffs at Buckton.

When I chatted to Gary Howard on Friday about maybe going out birding for the day on Sunday or Monday, we pretty much talked ourselves out of going to Yorkshire having assumed that the Green Warbler would have disappeared by then. By Sunday afternoon we agreed the time I was picking Gary up in the early hours of Monday morning and driving to Yorkshire !

We arrived in the car park at Bempton Cliffs at 6.15am after an easy drive, with already a few birders heading out as the light was just appearing most towards where the Warbler had been seen. We had decided to try for the Albatross first, as it had been seen yesterday evening on the cliffs and we thought it would be an idea to see the bird in case it departed early. We walked South along the cliffs towards a viewpoint called 'New Roll Up', before realising that the bird was last seen at a viewpoint called 'Staple Newk', without checking we assumed this was in the other direction, so we reversed our steps and headed North along the cliffs, arriving at the assumed correct viewpoint after 10 minutes we found this was not 'Staple Newk' and only then did we look at a map and see that 'Staple Newk' was the most Southerly viewpoint. So we reversed again and a further 10 minutes we were arriving at 'Staple Newk' where there were 2 birders intently looking out to sea. Asking the question 'has it been seen', the answer of '...err it's just flown out to sea' was not what we hoped to hear.

We spent the next 15 minutes stewing in silence pretending to look closely at the Gannets and Fulmars and wondering whether our plan for the day was already in tatters, when one or the other birders said ' its heading back in !' and there was the Black-browed Albatross flying towards us and spending a good 20 minutes circling in front of us before disappearing around the corner. What an excellent bird and astonishing to see looking down on the Albatross, at fairly close quarters through bins, as it performed several circles towards the cliffs in front of us! This coincided with the news that the Green Warbler had indeed been seen already this morning and our plan was back on track.

It only took around 25 minute to walk to the site the Green Warbler was favouring, a couple of hundred metres from the cliffs inland in a natural dip in the middle of arable fields where scrub bushes covered the site, which was used as a bird-ringing area. The habitat was densely planted with Willows, stunted Oak, Hawthorn and Rowans and as such there were limited windows of viewing, but quite quickly we had heard the warbler, with it's distinctive di-sybillic call but initially merely glimpsed movement rather than a full sighting. We relocated to one end of the scrub that gave a better but more distant view of some of the bushes and before too long the Green Warbler appeared feeding around a Rowan bush and we had excellent views through the scope over a period of about 15 minutes before it disappeared into cover. Over the next hour we had more brief glimpses before deciding that the initial views were not going to be surpassed and we headed back to the Bempton reserve.

The Albatross had decided to sit on the cliffs with some Gannets although the only view obtainable was fairly distant and was there at least for the next hour. In addition to the Gannets and Fulmar a few Kittiwakes were seen with some distant Guillemot and Razorbill on the sea, a Great Skua flew past along with a fairly distant Sooty Shearwater and a brief Manx Shearwater.

It was after midday before we left Bempton Cliffs and headed South to Blacktoft Sands. A rather slow route that saw us arriving after 2.30pm. Into the 'First Hide' and the White-tailed Lapwing was there in front of us, making it 3 mega rare birds in one day, a great tally and I doubt to be repeated very soon. In addition to the star bird, lots of Ruff, Snipe, Black-tailed Godwit, and Teal were feeding in the mud, several Yellow Wagtails dropped in and Bearded Tits were calling from the reedbeds. The Townend hide had more duck including Gadwall and Wigeon, a Water Rail appeared briefly and a Green Sandpiper and Common Sandpiper were around the edge the Singleton Hide had a Glossy Ibis, Great Egret, lots of Little Egret, which made for a good supporting cast.