Sri Lanka 1-3 March

Joy and I plus the Keith Wimbush aka “The Captain” and Ron Thomas aka “Godfrey” left my house a little before 3pm on the 28th February. The trip down to Heathrow was uneventful but rainy. We managed a couple of Red Kite on the M40 but little else. Everything when like clockwork, we parked up, got dropped off at Heathrow, up the escalator booked in the baggage and straight onto the plane.

Eleven hours later we landed in Sri Lanka, collected our luggage, changed some currency, then walked out to be met by our guide Chami and representative who I had dealt with on the internet Perry. It could not have been easier. I had organised everything myself and we were looking forward to ten days birding with a couple of days whale watching on the Indian Ocean to round off the holiday.

It was a long drive to Kitulgala, not great in distance but progress was slow. We did however, stop a couple of times to do a bit of birding. The first stop produced, Sri Lanka Swallow, Ashy Woodswallow, Brown Shrike and numerous Egrets. The second stop I had my first tick of the week in the form of a Lesser Yellownape, we also saw Asian Paradise Flycatcher, Lesser Flameback and Shikra.

We arrived at the Plantation Hotel, Kitulgala at around 4pm. It was a good standard hotel and the room was comfortable with air conditioning. After a quick shower we were out birding on the outskirts of the village. We had been warned beforehand about Leech’s, Ron seemed to think a bite would be terminal! He seemed rather pre-occupied with what might bite him rather than what he might see. One of his oft used phrases (and there were many) was “Are they dangerous”.

Back to birding, we soon had our first proper endemic – Sri Lanka Grey Hornbill, but the bird we were hunting for was Chestnut-backed Owlet one of two Sri Lankan endemic Owl species. Children from the local house/hut joined us in the search and they were so happy, even though they appeared to have nothing (a lesson for us all there me thinks). Eventually the bird appeared although it was by this time rather dark. So with two endemics under the belt we headed back to the hotel for food and a good nights sleep.

We met the next morning for breakfast at 6am then proceeded to cross the river by ferry, which was a hollowed out log, there was barely enough room to stand but we managed it – and it was quite exciting. We made our way along the trail, Chami our guide had been up at 3am to locate the roost site for the main target for the holiday the recently described Serendib Scops Owl. There were another couple of groups after the bird, but the guides had it sorted between them and there was a telescope set up. We got good views – but picking the bird up from the trail with binoculars was near impossible.

Serendib Scops Owl

We carried on birding seeing Sri Lanka Scimitar Babbler, Crested Drongo, Sri Lanka Blue Magpie, Brown-capped Babbler and Dark-fronted Babbler. Also, myself and the Captain picked up a couple of Leech’s, the little buggers had gone straight through our socks and helped themselves to an arm full of blood! We spend the next few hours checking ourselves every five minutes (mental note to self – buy some Leech Socks).

After lunch we travelled into the hills and had a good few hours birding seeing more endemics: Sri Lanka Hanging-parrot, Layards Parakeet and Yellow-fronted Barbet. Then it was back to the hotel for some more good food and another night of sleep.

The next morning saw us birding in the Kitulgala village where we saw a further four endemics, Green-billed Coucal, Spot-winged Ground-thrush, Legge’s Flowerpecker and Sri Lanka Junglefowl. After breakfast we changed hotel headed to the Blue Magpie Lodge where we saw Black Eagle.

Black-hooded Oriole

Chestnut-headed Bee-eater

18th March

Having just returned from Sri Lanka (more to follow) I am still on Sri Lankan time, so this morning I thought I would brave it and have an early morning walk around. Depressing doesn’t quite sum it up, but it is close. There were a few birds bravely singing but apart from that and a couple of Goosander it was dead. I can see adjusting to birding again in the Midlands going to be hard!

February in with a wimper (albeit a wet one)

Right, straight away, I haven’t seen anything at Shustoke, I have been, but apart from a couple of Grey Wagtail and five Goosander it is dead, to be fair, nearly everywhere else is as well. Granted we have Hume’s Yellow-browed on the doorstep which I have been back a few times for but still haven’t had stunning views.

On Sunday the good lady and I walked from the road at Kingsbury up to Middleton Lakes, where we were thwarted by the flood defences that are being built, this restricted access to to Kingsbury Water Park. We carried on up the canal towpath to RSPB Middleton Lakes, which were so wet that access again was restricted, not this time by flood defences, but actual floods. I think a better name would be RSPB Passchendaele!

Even though this reserve looks very good there were not great numbers of birds. It got me thinking that the number of Goldeneye that we see now in the Tame Valley are very similar to the numbers of Smew that we used to get 10 to 15 years ago. We did however, see two pairs of Stonechat.

This morning I took a walk around Ladywalk, again access was restricted, this time by a bloody great lorry parked in the entrance. The driver didn’t seem to understand where I wanted to go or English for that matter. He just stared at me as I made various gestures to convey what I wanted, in the end “Offski” seemed to work, he moved about 20 yards allowing me to squeeze past.

Bird wise, Willow Tit, Goldeneye and Shelduck were the highlights – god things are bad!

Late January

I have paid a few visits to the reservoir but it has been really, really quiet.

I have been birding, so far this year I have been the Wyre Forest (on the way to walk the Malvern Ridge) and seen two male, and one female Two-barred Crossbill. A week later  saw “The Captain” and Godfrey (think Dads Army) accompanied me on a day in Nottinghamshire where we saw several Parrot Crossbill.

I have also been to Norfolk enjoying a good day out birding, only to hear that a Hume’s Leaf Warbler had turned up on one of my “patches”, namely the Hams Hall Outflow. When the weather eventually cleared on Sunday I managed to get reasonable views. I went back on Monday and the bird was performing much better.

I have seen a lot of finches and buntings in the Moat House/Holly Lane area but it was the first time I had really had a chance to grill them. Viewing is really difficult as of Monday the hedges hadn’t been trimmed back. Anyway to cut a long story short I found a Brambling, there may well have been more there are certainly a lot of birds.

Wednesday 15 January

Managed to squeeze an hour in before dark tonight. I was struck by how low the water levels were, if only they could have been like that during August/September last year. Anyway, there wasn’t much around in fact there were only 23 Pochard. I checked out the woods around the small pool but it was probably just a little too late to make any impact.

Back at the car park I had a quick look and counted 23 Goosander in the roost but as I said little else.

A Quiet Start to the Year

Having check the reservoir several times since the turn of the year it has been rather disappointing with very little about. I think we probably need some cold weather to get the birds moving about a bit.

I had an email from Keith Whitehouse who lost a Garmin GpsMap60 Csx Sat Nav around the reservoir last Saturday, if anyone did pick it up let me know and I will forward his details.

Sunday 5th January

I made my third trip of the year over today seeing very little. There are very few wildfowl with the Pochard numbering a measly 32. There are very few passerines as well. On a normal visit I would expect to see between 40 to 50 species at the moment I am struggling to see 35!

It is probably as much to do with the mild weather as anything sinister but on a whole the Reservoir has been rather poor over the last year.

I walked from Coleshill down the River Tame and home this morning having a little more luck with Siskin, Lesser Redpoll, Treecreeper and the highlight a male Lesser Spotted Woodpecker about 400 yards further down the access road from the Ladywalk entrance by the fishing club, it was showing very well for about 20 minutes.