Category: THE PHOTOGRAPHS: by Tim Melling, Oscar Dewhurst, Paul Leyland, Guy Shorrock, Brian Leecey

Tim writes: some books and websites call this species Lesser Redpoll (Acanthis cabaret) but there is no genetic difference between these and Common Redpolls (A. flammae).  And from 1 January 2018 BOU officially dropped this species to become a subspecies of Common Redpoll when they adopted the IOC species guidelines.   So this is now Common…

Tim writes: I took this photograph in the Peak District’s Crowden Valley in mid-September when lots of birdwatchers were trying to see the Lammergeier.  But I was more amazed at the number of Ring Ouzels feasting on Rowan berries. The best count I heard of was 50 on 1 September but I visited frequently during…

Tim writes: this was the first time I had managed a decent shot of a Curlew Sandpiper.  I took it at Adwick washlands near Barnsley early morning in September.  The sun was shining without a breath of wind and this Curlew Sandpiper was close.  The water surface was rippleless creating perfect mirrored reflections.  I managed…

Tim writes: Sabine’s Gulls are quite a difficult gull to see.  They breed in the high arctic but migrate south after breeding to spend the winter at sea off the continental shelves in the southern hemisphere. In the Atlantic they mainly winter off southern Africa and South America. They are only occasionally seen from land,…

Tim writes: Wrynecks used to breed in Britain and in Victorian times were found in every county in England and Wales south of the Humber. But they had dwindled to extinction by the 1970s while a small population temporarily colonised Scotland, which was way outside its original range.  But I don’t think it has bred…

Tim writes: Greenshank is a scarce breeding bird of northern Scotland, with about 1100 pairs breeding particularly in the wet, peaty bogs of the Flow Country in the far north.  But the Scottish population is a tiny fraction of the European population that breeds in the taiga zone across Scandinavia and NW Russia which is…