Grosse Point Blakeney

It’s been nearly 30 years since I first walked up Blakeney Point – the reason back in 1983 was pretty similar to today’s, to see a (then) mega rarity whose identity was hotly debated. Then it was a Royal, or possibly Lesser crested, Tern (for younger readers it was a Lesser crested – at the time rarer than Royal). Today it’s an Empidonax. Yes, it sounds like something off a moth blog (and frankly we might as well take up mothing if we have to stick with genus-level ID) but as we all now know it’s really an opportunity for normal birders to morph into ringers and start using words like emarginations instead of just relying on jizz and optimism.

I’d planned a fairly low impact approach: leave the house before 6am, get to Cley by 8.30, by which time it should be clear whether the bird was still there – I’d then, depending on the news, either make the dash to the point or spend the day doing some real birding in Norfolk. Since these things usually don’t work out instead I spent the early morning looking after the kids.

When the bird wasn’t reported by 8.30 I thought I’d actually lucked out and saved myself a drive. But returning from a trip to the shops (at 8.50) I found sighting (for 8.30) has been reported 10 minutes ago. Norfolk it is then. The journey was pretty shyte thanks to some random road closures in London and slow traffic on all the A roads so I eventually turned into the road to Cley beach a little before noon. I'd been heading north through driving rain for the last 10 miles and knew I’d soon be walking through it. I also realised I'd massively underestimated just how wet this was going to get and had gone for an option that was a little too old skool: jeans, light walking shoes and a Barbour. Within five minutes of walking my jeans were soaked through and I was carrying half a pint of water in each shoe. Walking along the point carrying my own weight in water, through rain, hail, sand and shingle, seeing hundreds of satisfied birders coming the other way was pretty tough – I couldn’t see anyone heading the same way as me until I eventually caught up with two birders (who then paused to shelter behind the Half Way House) and, a little later, a guy from Stoke.

A little over an hour from setting off I arrived at the Plantation and straight away got onto the flycatcher flitting around at the back of the trees. I’ve limited experience of the likely contenders in the US and none at all in the UK (I didn’t go to see the Cornwall bird as I have a strict ‘can't be arsed’ policy on long distance twitches) and had felt pretty comfortable about ruling out Yellow bellied from the photos, in the field you could certainly get where the early ID was coming from as the throat and belly could look strikingly yellow in certain lights and positions. Overall one of the things that surprised me was just how different the bird looked from the photos that were published early on. The photos showed a bird with very white wingbars and off white underparts that didn’t reflect the bird in the real life - where it could sometimes look like a Garden Warbler and at other times a Brambling. OK, OK maybe not, but the bird could show a really quite buffy med cov wingbar, much darker underparts (although with paler flanks that probably explains the appearance of paler underparts in many of the ‘side on’ photos) and, in the right light and at the right angle, quite a bright lemony yellow wash on the throat and belly.

Walking back would have been pretty hard without seeing the bird, but was partly warmed by a ready brek flycatcher glow and partly by some great birds. Long tailed and then Arctic Skuas nearly over the beach, loads of Gannets, a Guillemot a few yards offshore and a Grey Phalarope flying up the point. Back in 1983 I missed the Lesser crested the first day out – I had to do the walk again the next day before I connected. Then I was nearly thirty years younger. Today, would I have gone out for it again , even in the same weather? Yes definitely, even if we can't tick the bloody thing.