Ellis' Birding Blog: A Fantastic Few Days in Norfolk!

On Friday 21st of February we went to Norfolk for the weekend to hopefully see some amazing wildlife.

Day 1
On the way to Blakeney, Norfolk (the place where we were staying) we decided to stop of at Sculthorpe Moor to look for Bramblings. When we arrived we asked in the visitor centre to see if there was many around and they said "Yes"! So we decided to have a quick walk around the reserve looking for these fantastic birds. On the way we spotted a group of Egyptian Geese in a field! Although they were quite far away, they were still fantastic to see. As we were walking through the wood we spotted some feeders just ahead of us so we decided to watch them for a while and within a few mins we were enjoying great views of a stunning Brambling! We watched this amazing little bird for a while before it flew back through the wood. We also saw lots of Chaffinch, Bullfinch, Blackbird, Greenfinch and Goldfinch plus we saw a very showy Wren.

Egyptian Geese

Wren

Brambling

Day 2

Today we decided to get up early and then go to Cley. When we first arrived I noticed lots of birds flying around in a field near the car park. Most of them were Meadow Pipit and Skylark but then we saw 2 cracking Stonechats land on a fence. We went over to get a better view and they allowed us to get really close to them. A few feet away at one point! It was really nice to get really close to these fantastic birds. After that great surprise we had a walk along the beach were we only managed to see a Turnstone.

Stonechat

After that we went over to RSPB Titchwell for the rest of the day. At Titchwell we got many great views of all kinds of birds such as Bar Tailed Godwit, Redshank, Sanderling, Turnstone, Pintail, Brent Geese, Marsh Harrier, Avocet and we also saw some distant Vlevet Scoter offshore with about 2,000 Common Scoter! We got great views of the Velvet Scoter through the scope. We had a very enjoyable time walking around Titchwell, it is a place I would definitely visit again.

Ringed Bar Tailed Godwit

Brent Goose

Sanderling

Redshank

Day 3

Today we once again got up early to go to Cley again but sadly today we didn't see as much as we saw yesterday. We saw Dunlin, Ringed Plover, Marsh Harrier and Little Egret. The Little Egret showed quite well sitting in the middle of a small pool which we could get fairly close to.

Little Egret

Sadly this was our last day in Norfolk so we had to go back to check out of the hotel quite early. On the way back we decided to have a look in Edgefield for the Parrot Crossbills. We parked in the car park and then walked across the road to the area of where they had been sighted. We saw a lot of birders at the other end of the heath so we walked over there, on the way we saw a few Common Crossbills in the pine trees. When we reached the big group of birders we asked some people if they had seen them and they replied "yes they have been flying around the area for a while but we cant see them at the moment". While we were waiting there was a nice male Common Crossbill keeping us entertained at the top of one of the pine trees. After about 5mins of waiting we noticed a group of birds land on a dead tree in the middle of the heath. We got our bins on them and realised that it was the Parrot Crossbills! They are quite a bit different than Common Crossbill as they have a chunkier bill and they are also slightly bigger than common. We were really pleased to have seen and got good views of these brilliant birds. They stayed at the top of the dead tree for a good ten mins before flying around and landing in some pine trees were we got even better views!