Family of four Otter at Hillswick this afternoon as we - and they - ate lunch on the beach @dbradnum.bsky.social @jameslowenwild.bsky.social @koneheadsegg.bsky.social

Radde's Warbler at Tangwick was our best team find of the week on Shetland so far @dbradnum.bsky.social @jameslowenwild.bsky.social

At last we find a decent bird! Radde’s Warbler, Tangwick, Shetland. with @dbradnum.bsky.social @koneheadsegg.bsky.social @moorebirdsbybike.bsky.social

A map of records of migrating Nutcracker - seemingly all Slender-billed (machrorhynchos) - from Southern Sweden in the last week. Also this great video of 48 migrating SW at Falsterbo today. Definitely something afoot with this species this autumn... www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ol-I...

Nice juvenile Caspian Gull at Burnham on Crouch this afternoon (from a sailing boat!) - obviously all over the East coast this year but with the proximity to the breeding site, tempting to invite narratives of it being British-bred... Anyone know if the Pewet Island juveniles were ringed? #ukbirding

The Abberton WTE from this morning unsuccessfully hunting a Herring gull, it caught it twice but it still got away #essexbirding

Cracking start to 2026 birding with 101 species around Colchester area, mostly Abberton and Fingringhoe. Hen Harrier, Peregrine, Gtr and Lesser Scaup, Black- and Red-necked Grebe, Tundra Bean and White-fronted Geese, 5 Smew inc 3 stunning males, close Little Stints, 3 Bewicks and plenty more!

www.artsobservasjoner.no/Image/3005980 This is news to me. The regular Northumberland wintering Black Scoter spends the summer off Varanger, Norway.

WE NEED YOUR HELP! Descriptions and/or photos are required for a number of Essex rarities from 2024. The full list can be found at ebws.org.uk/2024descript... If you saw any of these, please submit a description - there's a video on the link that explains more. Thank you #essexbirding

Sunday 7th anyone visiting wigborough Church Arctic warbler please note we are keeping the church side of carpark clear for churchgoers from 10.30am.extra parking been arranged opposite first entrance(gate is open please park in there only)noParking on vergeFrontGates ) #Essexbirdnews #EssexBirding

A superb bird and a brilliant way to end the week. Echo the congrats to Chris and Sean, excellent find.

Simon Patient@simonpatient1.bsky.social · last yr.

A fantastic mad rush to locally twitch the Arctic Warbler in Essex at Great Wigborough church this evening. Initially a no show, i felt a dip coming on and then refound by Stuart. Well done on the finders @snixon66.bsky.social and @chrispoole050.bsky.social. 👍 My 2nd for Essex #essexBirding

Another birding paper! 🐦Where do the Nearctic landbirds that show up in Europe each autumn come from? We usually assume they come from NE populations, pushed off course by bad weather - but is that the whole story? #ornithology 1/3 www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Based on plumage variation, we are confident there were 9+ red-footed falcons at Carlton Marshes over the last three days. 2 adult male 3 females seen hunting dragons together, with at least 4 sub-adult males.

Interesting to see the origin of this bird - a little disappointing but unsurprising that it's of captive origin... #suffolkbirding

Stephen Dunstan@dunners.bsky.social · 2y ago

Thanks to Chris Batty for pointing out that the mobile Dalton-in-Furness White Stork appears to be up to its old tricks at this time of year. Interestingly it appears to have gone over Scarborough on more or less the same date two years running. Things may get simpler if it's ever caught!

Calling all #ukbirding County Recorders interested in cleaning and extracting data from eBird. I have updated the app I developed with @ollie333.bsky.social, and moved it over to a new hosting platform. You can now find it here: dbradnum-ebirdcountyrecordcleaner.share.connect.posit.cloud

Excellent birding at Abberton in long-awaited sunshine today: Black-throated Diver, drake Lesser and 4 Greater Scaup, drake and redhead Smew, 4 Bewicks Swan, 9 Med Gull, 10 Black necked and single Slav Grebe, and a somewhat Lesser Scaupy female Aythya hybrid! #essexBirding

Shore Lark still present on Stone Pt, East Mersea and showing well at times in spite of dogs.... #EssexBirding

At Abberton, from LDLH causeway then flew towards Lodge Lane area

Nicholas Warner@nickwarn57.bsky.social · 2y ago

DRAKE Lesser Scuap #essexbirding

A rather grey and dreary day weather-wise, but brightened first by a superb (unusually vocal) Pallas's Warbler at the Naze, and then by finding a drake Lesser Scaup below Abberton church - perhaps one of the 5 birds from previous winter? Also 3 Bewicks and a female Greater Scaup there. #essexBirding

Cool bit of data visualisation showing communities and clusters in the 13 million Bluesky users - joelgustafson.com/posts/2024-1... Sounds like the full graph will only load in full Chrome browser (rather than on a phone)... But if you do, there is already a clear UK Birding cluster!

Interesting #birdHybrid reported recently from Rainham Marshes #EssexBirding #londonBirding, looks good to me for Mallard x Gadwall as suggested - though welcome informed opinion from others on this? ebird.org/checklist/S2...

eBird Checklist - 25 Nov 2024 - Rainham Marshes RSPB Reserve--Essex section - 55 species (+1 other taxa)

Submitted by Caroline Quinn.

ebird.org

I'm sorry for the current SkyFeed outage, I'm pretty sure it's caused by @fly.io which I use for smart caching of feeds. It usually works great. See https://status.flyio.net/ for status

🧵 How to get connected in Bluesky without upsetting anyone - Some thoughts on hashtags & feeds related to UK wildlife. Long thread! Hashtags do as you'd expect. Feeds usually use hashtags, but are much more powerful: multiple selection criteria, incl. user lists, hashtags, +ve & -ve keywords, etc

About 80 species seen with 10 miles of home today, highlights a ringtail Hen Harrier and 8 field-stalking Gt White Egrets at Copt Hall, a smart adult Caspian Gull and a scruffy juv Spoonbill at Abberton, and swirling waders and a calling Redpoll at Fingringhoe. #essexBirding

Just a reminder to Norfolk birders joining bluesky there's a Norfolk birding feed you can add to your feeds, if you use #NorfolkBirding it will also be picked up by the national UK birding feed too, no need to use both hashtags.

Dave Andrews@pterodroma.bsky.social · 2y ago

If anyone's interested I've created a Norfolk birding feed to bring together bird news posts from Norfolk. Use the hashtag #Norfolkbirding

What on earth has happened?! The sky has turned a strange colour and there is a big yellow ball up there... Black Redstart on shore nr E hide the best so far at Minsmere #suffolkBirding

If anyone's interested I've created a Norfolk birding feed to bring together bird news posts from Norfolk. Use the hashtag #Norfolkbirding

Pleasant day of #SuffolkBirding with a few decent scarce migrants. Confiding Hawfinch at Minsmere could be found by listening for haw seeds crunching! Also elusive Temmincks, Whimbrel, smart Redstart, Wheatear, Reed Wblr, Casp and YL Gulls here. Earlier, nice Ring Ouzel at Thorpeness but little else

Plenty to see on a sunny stroll around Old Hall today, 79spp in total. 14 Spotshank and 11 Greenshank on Abbotts Hall breach at high tide, 3 juv Little Stint and 7 Yellow Wag on Bale Field, plenty of Hobby action and - best of all, and unexpected - a superb juv Merlin atop a hawthorn. #essexBirding