Double Dip Time!!

With a pre-Christmas trip back to the Suffolk homeland, it seemed a no-brainer to pop into Abberton Reservoir and attempt to get the long staying Canvasback onto my life list. I had just over the hour to find it!! Arrived at Layer Breton causeway, checked Birdguides, the bird had been seen at 9.53, we arrived at 10.05am. No other birders present! Now obviously the more pairs of eyes the better, when you are about to try and find a single bird on huge reservoir absolutely caked in Pochards and other Wildfowl, for the uninitiated a Drake Canvasback, a vagrant from across the Atlantic looks like pretty much exactly the same as a Drake Pochard except it has an all black bill whereas the Pochard has a splodge of blue on it's bill!! Despite this Margie decided she would rather sit in the car and read her book rather then help find my lifer😢!!! I may forgive her at some point!!😂

There are literally thousands of birds on both sides of the causeway, I begin to work my way through them with the scope!! Lots of them asleep with the bill tucked away, lots more buried in the tree lined banks, those that are awake are diving and reappearing at random!! To cut an hour an half, long story short ( I stretched my hour to the limit😂) I didn't find it!!😢😢😢😢 and if I see another Pochard this year I will probably throttle it!!!! Pretty much the only other bird in the throng of Pochards, Tufted Ducks and Shovellers was a single male Goldeneye. Loads of Egyptian Geese present, seems to be the major change since I was semi-regular here, always used to be a few, but were everywhere this visit! 

Drake Pochard

Black-headed Gull

Drake Goldeneye amongst the Pochard

Just started working my way through this group, when they decided to take off!!

About 0.00001% of the Pochards

Some of the Pochard were really close

They are a cracking looking bird mind you!!

Think this is called a Nasal Saddle, used in as similar way to ringing

This one got my hopes up, with little blue in the bill, but the head shape is Pochard, slightly different in Canvasback  

Just up from the dive

At least the light was nice

You may think that was too many Pochards, but I felt you would get to share my experience!! 

Giving up we headed up to Suffolk, to meet up with family and friends!! Which included meeting my new Great Nephew, Oscar!! 

Cute, Cuddly and Adorable and there's a Baby as well!!!😂
Me and Oscar💗

So fast-forward three days, family duty done, (very enjoyable to catch up with multiple people, an average of three visits a day, don't think I've ever been so sociable!!) We are on our way back, got to pop back to Abberton and have another crack at the Canvasback, checking Birdguides, Waxwings at Severals Business Park, it's on the way, gotta be done! we arrived on site a small group of Birders standing about in the way Birders do when the birds aren't there. I get out of the car, no sign came the reply to my enquires, dagnabit!! I then looked down the road, several birds high in a tree, pointed them out to a guy with bins!! Yep Waxwings!! Result!! We kitted up and headed down to the birds, yes we, Margie decides Waxwings are worth getting out of the car for!! The Birds showed well, though it was a very grey morning, the birds are beautiful but somehow I've made them look sinister in my pics!!😂

Part of the Flock

To start with they were high in the trees

But soon dropped onto the berries

Worryingly for those of us hoping they will get down to Sussex, there are  tons of Berries in the area!!

On to Abberton, full of confidence, plenty of time, though the light was worse than on Tuesday, pleased to see several other Birders present, scopes out, even more pleased when one said he'd seen the bird a quarter of an hour previously!! Settled down over the scope again, seemed to be even more Pochards this time and well over half were asleep!! To cut and even longer story short after 2 and a half hours I gave up, I will have nightmares featuring Pochards for the next few months for sure😡😢!! Once again Margie chose the warmth of the card to the hard yards on the scope😢😂!! 

Can't win em all!!

 We relocated to the other causeway to see what was about, Couple of Goosander, several Great Crested Grebes, some Tufties which had a Scaup asleep among them, this was pointed out to me by another Birder, I hadn't bothered with the Scope, pic below. On the bank was a showy Redshank and on the other side a nice Grey Wagtail!! A quick visit to the visitor center, where I purchased a jar of Passionfruit and Mango Curd and we were on our way!!

A Leucistic Egyptian Goose 

Pochard, spared you most pics of Pochards today, the light wasn't very good and you've suffered enough!

Pochard

Scaup, I think, middle at the back!

Drake Goosander, sadly distant

Great Crested Grebe, being weird

Drake Tufted Duck

Common Redshank

Female Goosander, came a little closer than the male

Grey Wagtail

Not a bad selection of birds, but always a bugger when you don't get the target, hopefully will get another chance at one in the future!!!!! Nice to see family and friends as well!! I have in the spirit of Christmas forgiven Margie💓