A 5am start for a longish drive to a Black Grouse lekk at 1st light. I was pleased to arrive at the site, 10 birds already visible in the near dark and to see no-one else here on a weekend, good do was the thought! After parking up and getting the camera ready another car could be heard then another until 5+ were around me. Not to worry birds still here and strutting their stuff, various burbling noises being made and the light getting slightly better, time to test the settings on the camera. A few shots taken but very poor quality given the lighting i decided to spend a while actually looking at them in the binos rather than through the lens. Gorgeous birds.. More birds kept arriving from different directions until at least 20 Males were there.
NOTE- Its very important to stay in your car here at all times as the birds are very wary. Windows down on the car are fine. Then some wally behind me decide to start and rev their engine and the whole lot lifted and flew over the road and to the moors. Lekk ended!!
Some "alrightish" bad light shots.
Onward journey towards the North Wales coast through some stunning scenery with the sun starting to peep through, in search of a couple of Blk Redstarts, Snow Buntings and Purple Sandpipers near Llandudno and Rhyl.
Next stop Llandudno and a couple of Blk reds, Fulmar, Peregrine, Chough, Scoters and Grey Seals.
A move onto Rhos for a few Purple Sandpipers which took a bit of time to find amonst the boulders but they give some decent views after lots of crawling on the dangerous rocks...
Next stop Pensarn Beach for a look for some Snow Buntings. 3 were seen but were very flighty and mobile, no pics sadly, so decided to move on to Kinmel Bay and Rhyl to try and locate some others. Unfortunately none to be found there but a lovely Ad Iceland Gul drifted east along the beach, 100`s of Scoter inc 2 Velvets and 200+ wigeon were on the sea.
Time was getting on after a very long and tiring day so decided enough was enough and the long drive back along the A55 was done.
An really excellent days birding in, at times, beautiful scenery.
Craig.
-- Edited by C Bel on Friday 4th of March 2016 05:11:52 PM
Brilliant photos - nice mix of species. I have never seen Black Grouse before. Might have to do something about that this year. I must say the European Black Redstart is a much more handsome bird than the Eastern Black Redstart - even though the latter has more orange on it.
