Odd Wagtail at Barnes

A morning trip to Barnes on a chilly and grey May day brightened up with a flock of at least 15 Yellow Wagtails on the Grazing Marsh. Initially quite distant they slowly worked their way around the bank. One of them was a very attractive and interesting bird that at first glance I thought might be a Channel Wagtail (a hybrid between flava and flavissima) since the head colour was very pale grey but the grey extended out onto the mantle and scapulars and the supercillium was bright yellow.

I had a look at a few books, mags and websites when I got home and found out that some flava do have yellow supercilliums (called xanthophrys) but I don’t see that a hybrid between a ‘xanthophrys’ flava and flavissima (which might have a yellow supercillium) would also have the pale grey mantle shown by this bird. There is a green tinge to the scaps but it’s mostly grey.

Maybe a hybrid between a Channel Wag and a standard flavissima could show this combination? But I still don’t see where the pale grey mantle comes from. So maybe just an odd Yellow Wag with some kind of colour abnormality? Stunning bird whatever it is. I shall try to do some more homework, but all ideas welcome.

UPDATE - just seen that this has been reported as a Blue headed Wagtail (flava) on Birdguides. I don't see how it can be, but interested in comments.

Another wagtail post

Yet another wagtail themed post - this time a Yellow Wagtail at Barnes. This is my second of the year here, and this one, like the first in the spring, was also feeding around the feet of the cattle as they kick up insects. This time, though, it's feeding in longer grass so you can only see it every 10 minutes or so when one of the cows gives it a kick (or just gets to close) and it flies up.

None of the other recent goodies around - the sites had small numbers of Ring Ouzels moving through over the last few days and I've only been able to get her eon the days when they haven't been seen.

Also good numbers of Black headed Gulls (c190) with a couple of Common Gulls and small numbers of HG and LBBs around.

Wigeon numbers are still fairly low (9-10), likewise Lapwing numbers are a llittle down from usual levels at 35-40 birds, also c30 Gadwall, c20 Shoveler, around 8 Snipe, although they're being a bit skittish so hard to count accurately, Peregrine over the river, approx 4 Chiffchaffs including one doing a fairly flat 'weet' call. Just like a few days ago there are reasonable numbers of hirundines around: 25+ Swallow and 30-40 House Martins.

Since it's a bit quiet I thought I'd try an experiment and do a three way lens comparison. This means comparing the results of (1) the 400mm f5.6 lens with (2) a 560mm (400mm plus a 1.4 teleconverter) and (3) a digiscoped shot through the scope using a 50mm lens and using the 20x on the scope zoom. In theory this should give around 1000m but in practice it looked a little under, more like 980-990mm (assuming the 400mm focal lengths are right anyway). I’ve tried to pick out the best shot from a fairly short burst on each of the three options as a fairly rough n ready comparison.

This photo gives an idea of the distance - full shot from the 400mm

Baseline shot: 400mm f5.6, 1/640, ISO 16000

The following three pics are crops from the 400mm, 560mm and digiscoped shots. As usual these are cropped but nothing else.

Crop 400mm, f5.6, 1/640, ISO 1600

560mm (400mm + 1.4 MkII Canon), 1/250, ISO 1600

Digiscoped 50mm f1.8 (at f5.6) through Swaro 20-60x (at 20x), 1/200, ISO 1600

I think I'm getting a bit more detail (and better colour) from the 560mm shot than either the 400mm or the 1000mm digiscoped shot. The other take out seems to be that the 400mm is slightly forward focusing (the Mallard seems to be in better focus on the autofocused 400mm shot than the Wigeon).

Barnes Firecracker

A wander round the reserve boundary before it opened didn't produce that much (mainly Mistle Thrushes).

When it eventually opened picked up a couple of Willow Warblers (one in the trees around WWT Hide, another singing from around the Sheltered Lagoon), a Greenshank flew over WWT calling while a Sedge Warbler sang from over to the right of the hide, walking over to Peacock Hide a Lesser Whitethroat was singing. Was only singing the first scratchy bit of the song without the final repeated notes. Chatting to one of the LWC guys there when they got a call to say that a Firecrest was showing over in Wildside so wandered round to the dragonfly pool and after a few minutes a female Firecrest was showing in the scrubby trees through the birches. Crown bright yellow with no sign of orange so seems fairly safe to sex. Also around a 3rd Willow Warbler, 2 Wigeon on the grazing marsh, 3 Wheatear (2 on the grazing marsh and one on the east bank) and Yellow Wag acting just like a Yellow Wag should - feeding round the feet of one of the Barnes Highlands.

Also dropped into Staines where 18+ Little Gull, a single Goldeneye and the Great Northern Diver still present.

Springtime for Sheppey

Still 6 Brents hanging on in the fields towards Sheerness, 3 Pintail flying over, f Common Scoter offshore, a couple of Avocet, Yellow Wag and Swallows comin in off the sea.