Scilly Sojourns, Sept/Oct, 2022, Pt.2 - 28th & 29th September

Our stay on the Isles of Scilly had got o.ff to a bit of a slow start, as reported in Pt.1 of my account of our stay I am pleased to report that things picked up a bit as time went on, as noted below.

Wednesday, 28th September

I managed a relatively early breakfast,  and set off in the buggy for Carreg Dhu Gardens in the hope of finding a Firecrest. This place is known for its attractiveness to small birds on passage, and also for the exotic plants that grow in its sheltered location. I was seeing little and, once again, found myself resorting to photographing flowers, butterflies, and common birds.

This is one of many rather large flowers on a bush that was the size of a small tree.

 

Princess Flower (Pleroma urvilleanum) - Carreg Dhu Gardens

Specimens of Speckled Wood butterfly are of the subspecies insula and have markings on the wing that are more orange than the pale cream  of the nominate species. They were quite numerous when the sun was out during our stay on this occasion.

 

Speckled Wood (Parage aegeria insula) - Carreg Dhu Gardens

Here are a few of the common birds. The Chaffinches were enjoying the seeds in the pods on a tree  that I did not recognise.

 

Robin (Erithacus rubecula) - Carreg Dhu Gardens

Chaffinch (Fringilla coelebs) (female) - Carreg Dhu Gardens

Song Thrush (Turdus philomelos) - Carreg Dhu Gardens

After being here for just under an hour, and seeing very little, a message came in that a Pied Flycatcher was again showing at Newford Ponds, so I  went there. 

I was at Newford Ponds for over an hour before before the Pied Flycatcher showed, but it was constantly mobile and hidden for most of the time that it was present and no photos were obtained. I also failed to get any shots of the two Goldcrest that were zooming around from time to time. 

I had a request to return to base with the buggy, and so was back by mid-day, but immediately sent out again to buy crab for lunch.

As the girls wanted the buggy that afternoon to go to 'Treasure Beach', I  hung around until they were ready to go, so that they could drop me off somewhere on their way. I chose to use this waiting time to check out what might be around on Littleporth beach, at the bottom of the garden, so that I could get back quickly when they were ready. Again I resorted to photographing common birds. The markings on the wings of this thrush lead me to believe that it is a juvenile.

Song Thrush (Turdus philomelos) (juvenile) - Littleporth

Until this year, Littleporth beach has been a quite rewarding place to watch birds, with numerous Rock Pipits, a few Pied Wagtail, frequent Stonechat, the occasional Black Redstart, and plenty of gulls and waders. However, on this visit, the beach was greatly dominated by Starlings and House Sparrows, with a few Greenfinch added in to the mix. Low tides also seemed to be lower than I'd ever witnessed here before. This did not make for easy birding or photography.

 

House Sparrow (Passer domesticus) (female) - Littleporth

Grey Heron (Ardea cinerea) - Littleporth

The Scillies is famous for its wealth of sub-tropical plants that grow there. I find this one rather attractive.

 

Cape Rain-daisy (Dimorphotheca pluvialis) - Littleporth

A message had come through about a Wryneck at Deep Point Quarry, and so I got the girls to drop me off near Normandy from which it was but a short walk to Deep Point.  I was not familiar with this location and spent half an hour or so wandering around the Deep Point area trying to find the quarry. In the end I resorted to putting out a question on the WhatsApp group to ask where the quarry was. I soon got a helpful reply to say that Deep Point Quarry was not at Deep Point but was at nearby Porth Wreck.

I spent around an hour and a half here, but failed to locate the Wryneck. I was entertained by the local Stonechats and what I believe to be a Meadow Pipit. However, I'm not any good at Pipit ID so please let me know if I have found something more exotic - it seemed strange that it was perched in this way.

 

Stonechat (Saxicola rubicola) (female) - Porth Wreck

Meadow Pipit (Anthus pratensis) - Porth Wreck

A message then came through about a Wryneck between Giant's Castle and the airport runway turning circle so I set off on foot. I failed here also. As I approached the runway turning circle, the sirens were going to indicate an approaching aircraft and the closure of the path. I stopped to take a photo of the incoming plane, which was G-BUBN - an 8-seater Britten-Norman BN-2 Islander, built in 1992.

 

Britten-Norman BN-2 Islander G-BUBN - landing at St Marys

After the plane had landed, the sirens ceased and the path was opened. I stopped to have a brief chat with someone coming in the opposite direction and was then about to continue when the sirens started again, forcing me to  stay put. This time it was G-BIHO -  a 19-seat De Havilland DHC-6 Twin Otter which entered service in 1981. I have never been nearer to a landing aircraft than I was on this occasion! 

 

De Havilland DHC-6 Twin Otter G-BIHO - landing at St Marys

As I approached Porth Minick, I managed a few poor shots of a Wren and a Stonechat.

 

Wren (Troglodytes troglodytes) - near Porth Minick

Stonechat (Saxicola rubicola) (female) -near Porth Minick

My walk ended at Old Town, where the girls kindly came to pick me up and take me back to base.

It had been another relatively unproductive day, but any day on the Isles of Scilly is a bonus!

Thursday, 29th September

The day started rather cold and windy, although I didn't record the temperature or wind speed, and continued that way, with sunny spells and a couple of very light and short showers of rain.

After breakfast, I took a stroll along the sea front, stopping to photograph a few birds on Littleporth and Porthcressa beaches.

 

White Wagtail (Motacilla alba) - Littleporth

Rock Pipit (Anthus petrosus) - Littleporth

Herring Gull (Larus argentatus) - Porthcressa

Rock Pipit (Anthus petrosus) -Porthcressa

I then continued up the path to Buzza Tower, stopping to look at the entrance grave (an ancient burial site) near the tower. In all my visits to the Scillies, I'd never been to look at this.  It was far from spectacular, however, but the view from here was! That's the entrance grave in the foreground.

View from Buzza Hill and Entrance Grave

I then headed towards Old Town, stopping to move from the pavement what I believe to be the caterpillar of a Ruby Tiger moth. I'm not sure that it was healthy as it seemed somewhat torpid.

 

Ruby Tiger (Phragmatobia fuliginosa) (larva) - near Old Town

I took a diversion into Old Town churchyard to see if I could find stick insects, but failed.

Heading towards Lower Moors, I came across the IoS Wildlife Trust team at the entrance to the reserve, preparing to do some work around the two hides on the reserve. I hurried ahead of them, hoping to see some birds before the disturbance that they would create. I arrived at the ISBG hide to find a good-sized group of mini-rangers in action. This is a marvellous initiative where pre-school children (under fives) are introduced to wildlife and get involved with maintenance work. On this occasion they were tidying the hides, armed with dustpans and brushes. I thanked them, and their supervisors, enthusiastically. I only saw Mallards and a presumed domestic escape before a message to say that the Wryneck was being seen at Porth Wreck again. 

A quick call to the girls at base had them come along with the buggy and transport me to a near access point for the Wryneck location.

I arrived to find a gentleman who had seen the bird earlier, still on site. He explained where the bird had been seen, and how it had disappeared behind a large rock and he'd not seen it again. I stayed for about an hour, before deciding to move on, having not seen the bird. The visit was not totally wasted, however, as it is always a delight to watch Stonechat, and a fly-over bird had me scratching my head for a long while as I originally thought 'Kestrel' then realised that it had been flying without any tendency to hover, was rather pale and sparsely marked under the wings, and had quite a pronounced dark 'moustache'. I, eventually, came back to my original ID.

Stonechat (Saxicola rubicola) (male) - Porth Wreck

Common Kestrel (Falco tinnunculus) - from Porth Wreck

I walked over the top to Porth Hellick, and into the Higher Moors reserve. At Seaward Hide I had great views of a Common Snipe.

 

Common Snipe (Gallinago gallinago) - Porth Hellick Pool

Various other items were also seen on the reserve.

 

Moorhen (Gallinula chloropus) - Porth Hellick Pool

Speckled Wood (Parage aegeria insula) - Higher Moors NR

Red Admiral (Vanessa atalanta) - by Higher Moors NR

The girls kindly came out in the buggy to take me back to base so I  could fix myself a very late lunch while they set out to go to Treasure Beach again. However, they ended up going shopping instead and were back much sooner than expected.

As the Wryneck had been seen yet again at Porth Wreck,  I decided to give it a third try. 

 

A group of 16 Gannets, relatively close to the shore, caught my attention. Here are three of them.

 

Gannet (Morus bassanus) - from Porth Wreck

I'd been there well over an hour and just said to a couple that I'd been chatting with that I would do them the favour of departing as that, based on past experience, would guarantee the bird would appear within minutes of me being gone, when the lady said 'what's that on that rock'. It was very distant and with my poor eyesight and relatively cheap binoculars I said 'it looks like a spug' (sparrow), but I  took some shots anyway and when I zoomed in to my shot (as shown in my 2nd image, below) I saw it was our target!

 

Wryneck (Jynx torquilla) - Porth Wreck

My shots would just about be acceptable as record shots but we found that if we went to the gate at the entrance to the quarry we got a better, but brief, view as it ducked back in when someone moved to a couple of metres in front of me .

 

Wryneck (Jynx torquilla) - Porth Wreck

With mission accomplished it was time to visit Higher Moors again to try for a Jack Snipe as two had been recently reported. Both birds were soon located, with the help of a couple already in the hide. However, one was photographically too distant and only ID-able by its bobbing movement, and the near one was hunkered down behind a rise in the terrain, as shown below - it's the one on the left, with Common Snipe on the right.

 

Jack Snipe (Lymnocryptes minimus) + Common Snipe (Gallinago gallinago) - Porth Hellick Pool

While waiting for developments in the Snipe situation, I took a few shots of the group of Greenshank with a Grey Heron near the far side of the pool.

 

Greenshank (Tringa nebularia) + Grey Heron (Ardea cinerea) - Porth Hellick Pool

After a long wait, with just two of us left in the hide, a Common Snipe sidled up alongside the Jack Snipe and set it in motion.

 

Jack Snipe (Lymnocryptes minimus) + Common Snipe (Gallinago gallinago) - Porth Hellick Pool

The Jack Snipe's progress was frustratingly slow to the extent that my companion remarked that it will be dark before it comes into full view (sunset was two hours away!). It did, thankfully, improve on that schedule, although in not the best of locations.

 

Jack Snipe (Lymnocryptes minimus) - Porth Hellick Pool

I am very fond of Snipe, and to get half-decent views of Jack Snipe was really quite excting for me.

 

It was now time to return to base, thus ending my birding day. It was, without a shadow of doubt, the best day for sightings so far in the break, and one of the better days photographically.

 

 

This brings me to the end of Pt.2 of my account of our visit to the Isles of Scilly. I intend for the third (and final) part of my account to be published in about a week's time.

 

In the meantime, please take good care of yourselves and Nature. Thank you for dropping by - - - Richard