Had a great day filming with Gordon Buchanan and crew from the Springwatch team today! The weather held out and we had great views of the Cattle Egrets at Treganhoe Farm, near Sancreed. The programme will be screened at the end of May, so keep an eye out for my ugly mug!!

There has been a White-crowned Sparrow at Cley, Norfolk for over a month now. It is a very rare bird from North America and is only the fourth record for the UK.

The Sparrow had been niggling away at me for some time. I really had to make the effort and go and see it but that meant taking a day off work and involved a long and tiring drive with no sleep for 36 hours! So be it!…………………

I arranged the trip with four other birders from Devon and Cornwall and by 11.30pm on Saturday 1st March, after picking them up at different locations, we were all aboard and on the M5 north headed for North Norfolk. We made good time and arrived on the Norfolk border at 04.10hrs and at our destination in Cley at 05.15hrs. A few of the group who had the back seat had already managed a few hours sleep and were now wide awake waiting for first light and listening for owls! This didnt bode well for my cat-nap!

By 06.30hrs we were all out of the warm car and kitted out in warm clothing waiting for the Sparrow to show. At 07.30hrs it did. Well worth the wait and the long drive. It showed down to 3-4 feet but only for two or three minutes then disappeared from sight. (it wasn’t seen again that day until 2.30pm!)

The rest of the day was spent birding on the coast. We visited Kelling Heath in search of an elusive Great grey Shrike. It was too elusive and didnt show to us but we were consoled with views of Dartford Warbler, Yellowhammers and a stunning male Marsh Harrier.

Salthouse Beach was our next port of call where we had a close encounter with a flock of Snow and Lapland Buntings and then on to the Norfolk WT reserve at Cley (rhymes with eye not hay). Here we saw Shorelark, Bearded Tit and Marsh harrier to name a few. A quick stop at Holkham to scan the geese produced Black Brant (the American version of Brent Goose) and an adult Ross’s Goose and Egyptian geese with hundreds of Pink footed Geese.

Our final hours in Norfolk were spent at the RSPB’s flagship reserve at Titchwell watching the likes of Ruff, Black-tailed Godwit, Spotted Redshank and of course Avocet. Two male Bramblings were a nice suprise on the feeding station and after a quick drink and bite to eat we were heading home.

Two Grey Partridge and a buzzard en-route back to Cornwall saw us reach 103 species seen in the day. The weather was sunny albeit a bit windy and the traffic was kind, we finally arrived back in Cornwall at 10pm, a full 24hrs since we left. A great day was had by all but we did agree that if we did it again we would stay overnight in a hotel!

The group (from L to R) Chris, Jyothi, Simon and Henry. (I took the photo!)

On Saturday 1st March i called up to see the ladies at St Ives Coastguard Watchpoint for a chat and a cuppa. It was a beautiful sunny day and was nice to escape the busy town centre. My first Fulmar of the year drifted west and one of the ladies alerted me to a brown bird flying towards us. As it got closer i realised it was a Stone Curlew! Usually confined to thier breeding areas in Norfolk and Suffolk, i’ve no idea where this one came from. It flew west around Mann Head and out of sight. A new bird for my Cornwall List.