Sunday, September 19, 2010

A belter of a Bunting.

Up at the caravan for the weekend I was halfway between Llangasty car park and the hide at Llangors Lake having just picked up a couple of nice Marsh Tits when a text from Dan alerted me to a Lapland Bunting found on the haul road near Sker on the GBC bird walk from the reserve centre at KNNR.
According to reports the bird was pretty settled and with me trying to build up a good species image library this was too good a photogrphic opportunity to miss,let's go for it.
I phoned Dan and was soon on the road down to Cardiff,Dan,Sophie,Geth and myself piled into Dan's car and we were soon on our way to Kenfig.
We were greeted in the car park by Phil Hill and Rob Gaze who had arrived at the same time and so we all walked down through the dunes together passing Peter Morgan and another birder on the way who both confirmed that the bird was still there.
We arrived at the location and for a good 20 mins the bird was nowhere to be seen,myself and the young "Twitchmeister" headed west along the haul road whilst the rest searched in the vicinity of the original location.
We were a few 100ms down the haul road and with the "Twitchmeister" getting more and more aggitated, "I hate searching and dipping" he moaned,a phone call from Phil confirmed the bird had been refound.
We hurried back with the "Twitchmeister" breaking into a trot (I don't do running anymore !!) and were soon on the bird,the light was excellent and I managed to get a good selection of shots as the bunting scuttled between the grass and the track.

We "filled our boots" with some great views and before leaving put down some marker stones for Matt Evans and Mark Duttfield who were at nearby Eglwys trying in vain to find the Grey Phalarope which had gone walkabout.

We met with them on the way back to the car park and wished them luck,a phonecall a little later in the afternoon confirmed that they had been successful.

A bit of a mad dash but a crackin' little bird to see and photograph,only my second in Glamorgan after the Werfa bird,a Glamorgan tick for Dan and a "lifer" for the young "Twitchmeister" taking his British life list he tells me to 240,"happy days" and Tunnocks all round !

2 comments:

Wayne said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Wayne said...

Cracking shots! Like the first one best. Better than Werfa
one
.

Did DJJ pass any of his photography tips on?