Holme Birding!

Thursday 13th October
I was recovering from two days on East Hills, so did not get out of the house until much later than I had intended. Wrote the blog up from yesterday and edited some pictures.

Went off to Holme Reserves to find my own birds. Parked up in the village car park and watched Bramblings, House Sparrows, Greenfinches and Hedge Sparrows feeding on grain in the near corner from my car. Robins, Chiffchaffs and Goldcrests were abundant. A dark juvenile Ring Ouzel landed briefly in the large willow – on my first view, my heart was racing as it looked like it could be a 1st year Siberian Thrush, but no it was just a Ring Ouzel – I say 'just', it was a striking bird.

I had a text from another birder saying 'Wonder where Norfolk's Siberian Accentor is? Yorkshire will be very busy at dawn...' I had no idea what they were talking about, so rang them to find out that someone had found the second Siberian Accentor for Britain this week in Easington, Yorkshire – unbelievable!!! Annoyingly though, I don't have national news on my pager and if I can't open the RBA website or Twitter etc (which is most places in Norfolk) I won't know about anything outside Norfolk until I get home and turn the Mac on, unless of course someone with national news kindly texts me, which is rare. How exciting, thinking about going in the morning! Unless of course I find one at Holme shortly – no reason why not, after all Connor found an Alpine Accentor here.

Parked the car by the five-bar gate half way along The Firs road and walked through the NWT Forestry, through the pines and on to Holme Bird Observatory where I stopped to chat to Sophie, Phil and David, before walking back along the Firs Road to my car. Good numbers of birds including Goldcrests, Chiffchaffs, Robins, Redwings, Fieldfares, Song Thrushes, Wrens and Hedge Sparrows. The pines and fallen dead pines from the 2013 storm surge, looked brilliant habitat for a Red-flanked Bluetail and Phil agreed with me – he said he had been sitting on a tree stump for ages waiting for one to appear! The sea looked spectacular and was crashing close to the dunes – quite a high tide this evening. Two little Grebes were on the Broadwater along with 2 Mute Swans and Teal etc.

Dropped some newspapers into my Mother's and then went on to visit my father in Heacham. Father was in bed, he seems to request to go to bed earlier and earlier nowadays, its a job to catch him awake early evenings! He seemed ok apart from saying "I would be very grateful if you could get me out of here" When I asked him why, he said he didn't like the people here. So sad, as there is nothing I can do. I updated him with all the big bird news and let him know all the family were ok and then left. Packing up my birding gear for the BIG TWITCH!