Doxey Gadwall - End of Year Birding

 Hi everyone, hope you all had a nice Christmas, and are going to have a nice new year. I didn't plan this trip until yesterday, so consider it a nice end-of-year treat. If you remember, we went to Doxey Marshes in November and saw lots of new birds. This time, we didn't see quite as much as we did last time, but we did see some nice birds we have already seen which are quite rare, and another species of duck I had never seen before.

The first birds we saw were a great egret and a grey heron. 

Here is the heron:

Here is the great egret footage we got:

There was also a flock of roosting cormarants. 

There were lots of teal about, and even a kingfisher, but unfortunatley it was too fast to get footage of. This next video is of a pair of shoveler in the distance.

The two other people in the hide even pointed out a pintail. It was really far away and I probably wouldn't have seen it if they didn't tell me. If you remember, I saw my first flock of pintail in the last post at Sandbach Flashes.

There was a flock of gulls consisting of herring, black-headed and great-black-backed.

My favourite birds I saw today were another species of duck which I had seen for the first time. It was a pair of gadwalls, and this time It was me spotted them. The males are the greyer ones, and are one of the only male ducks which are as dull as the females. 

The final thing we saw in the hide was a flock of snipe.

After leaving the hide we walked over to the screen in the middle of a reedbed. There was a huge flock of lapwings flying over. 

Just as we were about to leave, I saw another pintail on my final scan through my binoculars. It was quite far away, but you can see it bobbing up and down.

That is all for today's post. I know I said this last time, but I do think this will be the last post of 2024 so have a happy new year and look out for my top ten favourite bits of footage from 2024. I have also put the camera trap out over Christmas and will pick it up next year. It is not in its usual spot -  I have decided to put it in the spot where we got the footage for the post 'badger banger' (click here to see that post).

Remember to leave a comment and thanks for reading. See you next year!

A South American Duck in the UK?

 *this is part two of two posts - go check out my last post at Sandbach Flashes SSI.

Hi everyone, we will continue from where we left off in the last post.

After recording the song birds we went over the road to another lake. The first bird to stand out was a beatiful curlew.

Not a great video but here is a shoveler from very far away:

A long-tailed tit:

We also got some cracking teal footage:

If you read the last post you would know that there was one species of duck that I was looking for. On their website the site had reported two ringed teals, a bird which definitely did not belong here seeing as they are usually found in South America. That means that there is one unhappy duck owner out there whose ringed teals have escaped. Two birders came over to the lake I was watching and said they were looking for the ringed teal. Almost instantly one of them found it through their scope (much better than anything I had). He let me have a look but I knew that my camera wouldn't be able to record it. They were also very hard to pick out in a big flock of wigeons. However, further down the road it turned out you got a much better view of them. And it turned out that there wasn't just two, there was actually three; one male and two females. 

Here is some of the footage I got - the male is the grey one in the middle with a brown back and on one of the videos you can see the two females to the side of him which are darker and have a pale patch on their faces.

Sorry, the videos are a little shaky; it was quite far away. This is the one with just the male.

Here is the one with the females as well.

Just as I was about to head back someone called me over as they had seen a pintail (another species of duck). This was the first time I had ever seen one before. A small flock of them were very far away so the the quality isn't great.

That's all for today's post. I wonder if ringed teal will ever become established in the UK just like mandarin ducks have? It would involve a few escapes but it could happen. I will try and get the camera trap out for Christmas and of course New Year. I can't promise Christmas but I am sure I will be able to get it out before the new year. Thank you for reading all my posts over 2024, and have a nice Christmas. Stay tuned for the post where we look back at my top ten favourite bits of footage from 2024 which should release on new year's day. Remember to leave a comment and thanks for reading!

Sandbach Flashes SSI

*This is part one of two posts, part two will be releasing tommorow.

Hi everyone, today I have been to a place not far from where I live ( somehow I only found out about it a week ago) called Sandbach Flashes SSI. It was a really successful trip and I managed to get some of my best footage yet of wigeons, teals, curlews and some songbirds. After looking on their website at recent sightings there was one that caught my eye - a ringed teal. Admittedly I had never heard of one and after doing some research I found out it was a South American duck. I still didn't have very high chances of seeing them so I didn't get my hopes up. The first thing I saw was a massive flock of lapwings. (There is no sound on some of my videos from when the other birders were talking).

Another bird which there was loads of were wigeons.

There was a big flock of wigeons, mixed in with some bigger shelducks and cormarants.

The next bird was probably the best-looking one of the day. It wasn't a South American duck; it was a much more common Asian species - the mandarin duck. I have had them on the blog before, but the male was going through an eclipse (where they lose their bright colour and look a bit more like females). This time it was a bright and colourful male.

A nice robin:

There was also some other songbirds on the feeders, including goldfinches, great tits, blue tits and even a greenfinch up a tree.

That is all for today's post - part two will be out tomorrow.

Remember to leave a comment and thanks for reading!

Stag in the Snow

 Hi everyone, we have some exciting animals in today's post so stick around to see some nice footage. This is also the last post where we are celebrating my 100th post so remember to leave a comment. I left the camera out for two weeks instead of one like usual because the weather was rubbish. Here's a quick look at what's to come later in the post:

The first thing we got was a squirrel:

A few days later, we got a picture of an up-close badger. It ran away before the video set off so this was all we got:

Three nights later we got an exciting new bit of deer footage. It was the stag, and it was the first time we had ever got one at night. It was also snowing and it came right up close to the camera!

In the day time we got a robin in the snow.

About a week later we got another deer, this time it was a doe in the day.

The final thing we got was a spider in the bottom left corner.

I think it wanted to make a cobweb in my camera.

To say I had it out for two weeks, we didn't get much. Then again, the weather was bad, I had put no food out and the footage we did get was good quality.

Remember to leave a comment and thanks for reading!

Threegrets

 Hi everyone, this post is part two of my trip to Doxey Marshes. If you haven't seen part one, go and check out my last post. We are still celebrating 100 posts on Joe's Wildlife Blog so remember to leave a comment after reading this post. You may wonder what on earth the title means but that will soon become clear.

On one of the islands there was a pair of grey herons. However, they weren't what I was excited about; there was a flock of about 6 Lapwings resting on the island by them.

We also saw some cormorants. 

Here is a goosander:

I have had lots of new species of waterfowl on my blog lately (we found our first goosander last year so they're not too recent) and here is another to add to the score. It is called the shoveler, and has one of the biggest beaks of British duck. In the first video you may see some much smaller teals swimming around it, and in the second video you will get a better close-up.

Just before we going to move on to the next hide, I noticed something. What I thought were just three more great white egrets hunched up were actually a separate species and one I had never seen before - cattle egrets. There were three of them, and one had become more active than the other two. They are shorter and stockier than great white or little egrets. 

We had already seen two of three British egrets or 'threegrets' and all we needed to see now was a little egret. Despite there not being much there, the second hide ticked off the third and final egret.

Here's one final video of a great white egret and a little egret together.

That is all for today's post. I hope you enjoyed this visit to Doxey Marshes. It was the first time I have ever been. However, it is probably not the last as it isn't too far from home. I have put the camera trap out twice now and have got nothing exciting. It is out now and hopefully we will get something good this time - stay tuned for a camera trap post coming soon (hopefully).  

Remember to leave a comment and thanks for reading!

Doxey Marshes

 Hi everyone, today I have been to Doxey Marshes to try and spot some rare birds. I have just reached my 100th post and over the next two or three posts the celebrations will continue. I saw so much there that I have had to split this post into two parts - stay tuned for part two coming soon.

As soon as we arrived I saw a bird I had never seen before (in the UK - there is a chance that I had seen one in Italy although it was very far away and hard to tell) in one of the lakes; a great white egret. 

On the next lake we saw a juvenile great crested grebe. 

We carried on around to the first hide. On the way we saw another great egret fly over the marshes.

Once we arrived at the first hide I was shocked by how much there was to see. The one which caught my eye first was a shelduck. I had only ever seen one before at Seaton wetlands and that was a juvenile, so it was nice to see another one - and my first ever adult one.

On the other side of the lake I saw another great white egret!

Suddenly it flew towards us and you could see how big it was in flight.

A few minutes later the egret came into sight again.

That wasn't everything we saw at Doxey Marshes. However, that is everything for today's post. Part two will be out tomorrow and is just as exciting. Remember to leave a comment and thanks for reading!

100th Post

Hi everyone, just a quick post about the blog at the moment and what to expect. It is my 100th post so I thought it would be a good chance to talk about the blog currently. Over the last 4 years, I have been out taking photos and videos of the wildlife in the UK. In the future, I would like to get some footage of wildlife from other countries, but right now I am trying to see most British species. My main plans for the coming years are similar to what I am doing now; put the camera trap out and record my local wildlife. However, we have lately bought a campervan, meaning we might be able to go to more places across the country. My number one UK target is a wild boar, so it is likely that we will back at the Forest of Dean next year. If you have any other suggestions for where we should go, please leave them in the comments below. Anyway, let's have some fun and have a look at my favourite bit of footage from each year. 

2020

When I first started my blog I did not expect to get anything as exciting as a fox or badger. However, on its second night out, it caught our first-ever badger. Go check out my post 'badger sighting' to watch the full video.

2021

In 2021 I didn't put the camera trap out much, but when I did we got some good footage. For example, the fox having a poo would probably end up on my top ten of all time. However, nothing could compare to seeing my first-ever badger in the flesh.

2022

2022 was a good year for the blog, up until my camera got taken in Notts Forest :( - we did get a new one :).  2022 was also when I did my first yearly ranking. The number one spot was awarded to our first- ever roe deer. 

2023

In 2023, the number one spot was awarded to the animal I wanted to get on the camera trap the most. It was a tawny owl, and I have only had one since.

2024

2024 is going to be the toughest year by far to decide my top ten. I have an idea of what the number one might be, but you will have to wait until the end of 2024...

That is all for today's post. Thanks for all the comments and views over the last 100 posts. I know there was nothing new in this post, but the celebrations will continue over the next few VERY exciting posts. Stay tuned for more.

Kedleston Birds

 Hi everyone, yesterday I went to a national trust property called Kedleston Hall on the way back from Yorkshire. There was a river running through, and I saw a little egret on one of the trees. There was also a heron next to it. Here is the footage:

I also saw a flock of teals, which you can hear whistling in the video.

That is all for today's post. I hope you have enjoyed everything we got in Yorkshire and at Kedleston. 

Remember to leave a comment and thanks for reading!