I was out shopping this morning when the Mega alert went off: "Red-winged blackbird-North Ronaldsay.". I was straight on the phone to Simon Slade, and my place was booked on a scheduled flight for the following morning. Panic over!
There had never been one of these birds in this country before or even on this side of the Atlantic. The first images started to appear on Twitter of the bird as I was getting myself organised for an early start in the morning.
These images of the bird were put on Twitter by Simon Davies, the finder
I met up with the usual crew of Fred Fearne, Malcolm Curtin, Simon Slade, and Mark Sutton at Lymm Services, and we set off north to catch our plane from Thirsk. News then came out that the bird was still present, much to the relief of everyone in the car.
A couple of hours later, we arrived at the airport and waited for our pilot. A Lesser whitethroat showed well near the car whilst we waited, and we also had 7 Arctic terns over the airfield. Swallows have now arrived in full force, and one landed on a nearby building sunning itself.
Swallow
We didn't have to wait long before the pilot arrived, and we were off!
Plane sorted, we're off
The scheduled flight up to the Orkneys was great with good visibility. Two and a half hours later we reached the Orkneys and had North Ronaldsay in our sights.
Flying over the Orkneys
North Ronaldsay in the distance
We soon landed and started the half-hour walk over to the other side of the island, where we met Simon Davis, who worked at the bird observatory and had found the bird the previous day. Simon explained the bird was feeding in an iris bed and would have to be flushed to be seen. It didn't take long before the bird flew up towards us and landed distantly on a telegraph wire. I got straight on the bird through Dan Pointon's scope before it flew over to us and landed on some red gas bottles. The bird then showed well again on a roof before flying back into a nearby iris bed.
Scope views of the bird
That's better! Britain's first Red-winged blackbird!
There was no way the bird could be seen without an organised flush, which was well controlled by Simon, who would wait a few hours for planes to arrive and birders to gather before doing it again, putting the bird's welfare first and other breeding birds that had arrived back on the island. Read more for further information regarding this.
The Iris bed where the bird was found
Due to time and getting good views of the bird, we headed back to the airfield and did some birding on the way.
Common Gull
Other birds of note whilst walking back were Fulmar, Twite , Arctic and Great Skua. Getting to the airport, we met up again with our pilot and started the journey home.
North Ronaldsay Airport
The whole day had been fantastic, and we landed back at Thirsk at 5.30pm, eventually getting back to Ellesmere Port just after 8pm with another 1st for Britain on my list.
For further reading on how Simon Daves found the bird, read more>
For further reading on how Simon Daves found the bird, read more>
