Dave was picking me up at 7, to begin our fieldwork. Well, his fieldwork. We will be studying Yellowhammers on farmland, and Dave will be thinking and writing all about it, for his phD. The study site is a wee place called Barras, just south of Stonehaven, and its jammed with farmland birds.
I was having a great time, wandering round looking at the hammers, enjoying all the other accompanying species, such as Tree sparrows, Whitethroats, Sedge warblers, and Grey partridges. Add to that the great weather, and the constant presence of Hares, and singing Skylarks.Good stuff!
It was about to get better. As we sat in the car, eating our sandwiches, I got a text with info about a Great reed warbler, at Forfar. Being only 30 miles north of here, we decided it would be foolish not to try for the bird, so we said goodbye to fieldwork, and zoomed off down the road.
When we got to the site, we were astonished to find no other birders present. Geat reed warbler is a good bird! There should have been loads of people there. Still, we wandered round listening for the singing bird, and, after a while, located it in a tiny reedbed. I thought that this boded well, as the bird surely couldnt hide itself there for too long. How wrong I was! It was well over an hour before it finally showed itself, climbing up reeds, and sallying out over the water. The thing was huge, bulky, and long tailed, and really quite aggressive looking. More like a gargantuan reed warbler than a great one! Eventually, it took flight over the water, and disappeared into the reeds on the other side. All this in front of just 6 people! Maybe everyone was on the isle of May, looking at the Calandra lark. Which was just fine by me!
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