Desert Wheatear, Bempton Cliffs (Mike Watson)
DESERT WHEATEAR AT BEMPTON CLIFFS - a good do with Gary Jenkins. Despite being on the wrong side of the Pennines for Gary, in the Peoples Republic of Yorkshire, we had a fine morning photographing a fairly obliging first winter male Desert Wheatear along the edge of a cliff top field of winter wheat at the RSPB reserve. We were battered the whole time by a cold, strong northwesterly, which kept the wheatear out of sight most of the time in the lee of the tall chalk cliffs but we were also hindered by some unbelievably bad field craft on the part of some of the crazy fools ticking this one off. In the howling gale it was interesting to note that the wheatear never turned its back on the wind in all the time we were there and desperate to find something to eat we wonder if it succeeded? This was surprisingly my first ever visit to Bempton (!) and it was strange to see it minus gannets. Only the tangled messes of their nests, complete with bits of rope etc remained. We called it a day just after noon and the only other birds of note here today were around 30 Eurasian Tree Sparrows. I have seen literally hundreds of Desert Wheatears now but it is always a joy, especially in the UK, where we know that they will probably have travelled around 5000 kilometres to get here. What an amazing little bird!
Desert Wheatear, Bempton Cliffs (Mike Watson)
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