The brilliant Brecks

So Easter Monday saw David James & I take a trip to Suffolk in the vein hope that the recently reported Scarce Tortoiseshell would appear at Peewit Hill in Felixstowe. It was a glorious, sunny journey all the way down to Felixstowe. We parked up and had been out of the car no more than 5 minutes before the cloud rolled in and the temperature dropped. Typical! In all fairness, it's what the forecast said but who truely can rely on a weather forecast!

Nevermind! So, after a welcome McDonalds brekky, we paid a visit to Landguard Point and had a good wander around looking for grounded migrants. Sadly there was nothing more than a couple of Ringed Plover, a Turnstone and a single Chiffchaff. Time for Plan B...the Brecks!

We started at Santon Downham churchyard, a well known site for Firecrest. The place was alive with calling crests & Siskins and after a moment of tuning in a bit, we got onto probably 2-3 Firecrest, one in particular showed very well indeed. A couple of Mandarin also wizzed over while we were there.

A visit to nearby Grimes Graves drew a blank on the Great Grey Shrike, but I'm not entirely sure we were looking in the right place! We did stumble across a singing Woodlark though, a fine consolation.

We then spent a long while at Lynford Arboretum. Here we had our most success! First up was some time spent by the wooden gate where food has been put out for the birds. It wasn't long before 2 Brambling made an apprearance. These were a welcome addition to the yearlist with what has been a seriously barren winter for them locally. There were tonnes of Siskin about and the odd one was coming down to the food along with regular visits from Nuthatch, Marsh tits and other common woodland species.

Soon, a guy picked out 3 distant Hawfinch ground-feeding just to the left of the 'lane'. Soon, a male was picked up along the lane feeding amongst the leaf litter. The views while not too close, were really prolonged and just pretty awesome really!

After a while it disappeared for a bit before reappearing far closer just to the left of the lane. Here we gained our best views as it quietly foraged no more than 30 feet away. Brilliant! After a long while it vanished and we decided to go and look for Firecrest.

Soon after pitching up close to the folley, a singing Firecrest could be heard from the adjacent pines. Speaking to a photographer there, he said one had been coming down to feed on flies on the deck!! Thats nuts! So we hung around a while to see what went on.

Soon a Goldcrest showed up and did just that, and happily fed on the ground for a good minute or two no more than 15 feet away. Bizzare! All during this time 1-2 Firecrest continued to sing their hearts out closeby.

We got brief, distant views of a Firecrest feeding in the grass and daffodils under the pines before presumably the same bird appeared on the ground some 20 feet away. Here it fed for a minute or so affording amazing views, finding small flies around the base and roots of one of the pines. Really was an unusual sight! A Brimstone then cruised by, distracting Dave for a short while.

Dave's brilliant video illustrates the Firecrest antics really well:

We finished the day by visiting a reliable Stone Curlew site not far away. It was pleasing to get good yet distant views of a pair sat out in the sun. The end of what was, a great afternoon and a good laugh too.