But first, the report of the very first BOC Tuesday walk in November 1994: Nine members met in the car park at Snuff Mills at 10 am on a cool and overcast morning. It was generally considered that the murky conditions would not lead to a dynamic morning of birding and that we should concentrate on the bonus of mid-week…
Month: October 2014
Sunday 25 October – WWT Slimbridge (extra to programme)
On a mild sunny day we started our bird count working along to the Holden Tower just after high tide getting an impressive number of wild ducks. We then cut across to South Lake to add some waders and gulls to our list. Amongst the numerous Black-headed Gulls and Herring Gulls there were a few Common Gulls and one darker…
Tuesday 21 October – Hengrove Mounds / Manor Woods
On a fine but windy day the first part of the walk was around Hengrove Mounds, an old landfill site behind Cineworld. A group of 15 set off up a short wet slope and then followed the path along a belt of trees. Initial sightings were of Carrion Crow, Woodpigeon, Rock Dove / Feral Pigeon, and Herring Gull moving rapidly…
Sunday 19 October – RSPB Ham Wall
It was a sunny but windy day for our walk around the RSPB’s Ham Wall reserve. Bob Buck and John Crispin (both RSPB volunteers and experts at identifying birds) were our guides for the morning. We were going “off piste” into the conservation area of the reserve which members of the public don’t normally have access to. This was going…
Tuesday 14 October – Severn Beach
Despite the rain pouring down all night and a forbidding forecast, six intrepid members gathered for the high tide at Severn Beach. Their dedication was rewarded by the number and variety of birds they saw through their rain-spattered lenses. There were large flocks of Starlings swirling in the sky, flocks of Dunlin and Turnstones on the shore together with Ringed…
10 – 13 October 2014 – North Norfolk Weekend
This trip was billed as “something of a twitch fest” but it didn’t often feel that way, partly because most of the rarities we sought, either fell into our laps or else defied long and painstaking efforts to locate them. En route to Norfolk we saw a large number of Red Kites from the minibus, but our first birding stop…
Tuesday 07 October – Winscombe
Heavy rain, until just before the start of the walk, cleared to give a lovely blue sky for the ten hardy souls who had driven in hope, through the rain. Towers of Persil-white cumulus plus the occasional dark grey cloud gave a dramatic back-drop to a fair tally of all varieties of corvids, some gulls, Woodpigeons and hedgerow birds. We…