Red Alert

Weds. 1st June 2016.

Cold, wet, windy.

Having just arrived at Frampton marsh to see what we could find, a text came in from Nige Lound. He’d found a red-backed shrike at Crook bank, Theddlethorpe. We were along way from there but off we went. A party of four barnacle geese near the visitor centre were all we noted at Frampton.

Well, we never saw the shrike all day despite an intensive search around the area Nige had it, and beyond. He drove by later to  show us a cracking photo he’d taken earlier. ( That made us feel a whole better in the pouring rain!)  Whilst searching we found no less than five, poss six spotted flycatchers all feeding up well on an abundance of tiny moths.

Late afternoon, tired, wet, time to go, one last look at the sea which we’d checked earlier, rubbish, poor visibility, four kittiwakes north, Ben stops looking at the sea to watch the sanderlings, ringed plovers and dunlin on the shore, ‘Get on this’ he says. RED-NECKED PHALAROPE !

We always class our finds as joint or co-found when out birding, but I give full credit to Ben for this one. He just got it by checking through every bird thoroughly – a quick scan and it would have been missed, they were quite distant. I can’t remember seeing many reports of red-necked phals on beaches, it just seemed to be tagging along with the sanderlings, most of the time resting, crouched in the sand. We got the feeling it was a bit exhausted, but it flew around when the sanderlings did and fed a bit. By now it was blowing a bit of a gale and really cold in the northerly wind. Taking any photos was a real headache but I managed some digi-scoped record shots. Magical end to the day.

My Lincolnshire yearlist now 201 (BOU).   206 (UK400).