A very, VERY cold Farmoor

Nipped in again to Farmoor Res late yesterday afternoon, after having lunch with Ems in Oxford. Despite what I expected it was dead still and not an ounce of wind. BUT and it was a big but, bloody freeezing! Had seen no reports of either the Diver or Phalarope for a few days but all the same brought along Em's SLR in the hope the Phalarope was still knocking around. Sadly no Phalarope. However as we walked along the shoreline by the sailing club, what pops up no more than 20 feet offshore but the Great Northern Diver! Took me by suprise a tad! It was diving quite frequently and would be underwater for long periods, but still showed pretty bloody well when it was up. Eventually he drifted of into the centre of F2 and my hands were turning blue so off home we went. Rattled off a few shots of the bird (below):

Great Northern Diver
Farmoor Resevoir 29.01.12

Saturday 21.01.12: St. James' Park, London

Had a wicked Friday/Saturday with Em in London, taking her to Corrigan's Mayfair for dinner ( her Xmas present) as well as grabbing a cheeky champagne cocktail in Claridges at the very 'reasonable' price of £18 per cocktail!! So worth it though!
Saturday 28.01.12 we went to St. James' Park by Buckingham Palace. I love it there, a nice walk all the way round and some gorgeous (if non-wild!) wildfowl on show, plus the Pelicans roaming round. Was just a tad busy today with loaaads of tourists plus I think the Queen had been out to get her McDonald's breakfast, so there were simply hundreds of people, police etc round the front of Buck House.
After waiting around a bit we finished our walk in St. James' Park. There were a nice group of Red Crested Pochard on show with some very showy males:

Red Crested Pochard
St. James' Park, London 21.01.12

Further along the path was surprising to find, a Grey Heron gingerly coming to bread, people were feeding the geese! Was also possible to see Coots at close quarters and it made me realise how incredibly weird their lobed toes look. Bizarre!

Managed to see a few Ring Necked Parakeets high up in nearby trees as I'd hoped I would another addition to the yearlist! By then it was too cold and on we went for some munch and the British Museum!

St. James' Park selection (Top to Bottom):

Canada Goose, Grey Heron, Coot feet, Grey Heron with eyes only for bread & Bar Headed Goose

Saturday 21st January 2012: A cheeky little mosey in to Oxfordshire

So there was nout reported in Northants by Saturday morning. I'd been keeping an eye on Farmoor Res. near Oxford holding both Grey Phalarope and GN Diver. These would make a couple of pretty decent additions to the old year list plus hadn't seen a GN Diver for a while. Plus looking at Birdguides, the Oxforshire wintering Temminck's Stint was just 3 miles along the road at Rushy Common Nature Reserve, bonus! The journey consisted of a Red Kite flapping around a field by the M40 close to Middleton Stoney and a Raven cruising past along the A34.
Around 12:30 I was in the Car Park at Farmoor. As soon as I got to the resevoir edge it became pretty dam obvious where the Phalarope was, with a couple of peeps with cameras peering over the concrete edging of the resevoir about 50m along the perimeter path.
Low and behold there he was, so so close, no more than 6-7 feet away, closer than the Grafham bird I saw back last Autumn. He fed in exactly the same way, swimming along feeding upto roughly the same point before trundling back the same way. I watched it for a bit, getting a few snaps with my iphone, though for god sake yet again I which I had a nice big expensive SLR!!!
Another birder pointed out the GN Diver on the far side of F2. When I say far side, I mean far side. At 60x it was still a distant spec but you could just about make it out despite the strong wind.

Grey Phalarope. Farmoor Resevoir 21.01.12

Would have been great to get a decent view of the Diver but that would have meant a 2 mile plus walk around a very windswept Farmoor and wasn' feeling that, plus was keen to get back for Soccer Saturday of course!

So far so good then, 2 of the 3 birds done and dusted. So onto Rushy Common about 3 miles to the northwest. Didn't realise how many gravel pits there were round here. The reserve was along a rather shitty litttle lane, pothole central! Here was my kind of birding, get out of the car, set up the scope and view the bird no treck!
People there had lost it but I soon found it again on one of several little muddy spits in the NW corner of the lake. Was a little distant but you could see it well enough. Was pretty cool catching up with one of these in the middle of winter actually! It was in fact 1 of 2 in the UK this winter with one in Cambs too.
Rushy Common looked like a decent little spot, especially that NW corner, seemed pretty good for waders and wildfowl. There was all the usual ducks there with Wigeon, Gadwall, Teal, Mallard, 1 Shoveler, Pochards and Tufted Ducks.
From there it was home time. A very successful few hours!