The Drunk Birders Ride Again!

We might not have the skills of the 'Punk Birders' but someone must be reading our birds and beer pub watching blogs, Gary was asked recently '...are you one of those 'drunk birders?'. On Sunday for the first time in a few months Gary, James and myself went out again as a trio to hunt for autumn migrants. With the Eastern Olivaceous Warbler leaving Yorkshire overnight, we instead headed for Holme NOA and NWT reserves. We first looked in on the juv.Red-necked Phalorope at NOA's Redwell. A smart male Redstart added a little extra value to the £3 fee for entering the hide! We had a walk around the forestry behind the NWT Info Centre where eventually Gary located a Pied Flycatcher, but little else was around. Along the entrance track we watched a Garden Warbler catching flies at close quarters, a female Redstart, Stonechat and a juv. Red-backed Shrike, before two Peregrine then drifted over low. We then went to the pub, not just pub but the best birding pub there is, the Dun Cow at Salthouse. Here i added 5 new 'pub ticks', Canada Goose, Common Tern, Hobby, Whinchat and Greenshank. We also picked out Sandwich Tern, Wheatear and Gannet all good pub birds. Doubling back to Stiffkey we eventually caught up with a Barred Warbler not far from the campsite, and also saw Garden Warbler and Whitethroat. A brief stop at Cley coastguards failed to turn up any Lapland Buntings but during a quick seawatch we saw dark, light and intermediate Arctic Skua, a few distant Gannet and a close flyby Guillemot. With the sun starting to fall in the sky we walked the back of Weyborne Camp. We failed to locate the Wryneck seen earlier in the day, but Gary found our second Red-backed Shrike of the day, large flock of 30+ Pied Wagtail failed to hold a White Wagtail and a couple of Wheatear flitted about in the orange glow.