Sutton Bingham - Sun 27 Feb

Another late afternoon visit today and I made straight for the Fishing Lodge to check the Wigeon flock and see if anything else was about but other than loads of Redwings feeding in the fields behind the dam and a calling Raven it was very quiet. I then got a message from Pete saying a first-winter Iceland Gull was showing from the northern causeway, too distant to 'scope from my location (and against the light) I ran to the car and drove round, arriving less than 3 minutes after getting the message only to see Pete with his head in his hands as I got out of the car, it had flown off. Ironically if I had stayed at the Fishing Lodge I would probably had seen it in flight. Not another patch dip! After it became obvious it was not going to drop back in I went back to the Fishing Lodge as Pete had last seen it fly towards the north-east corner before he lost it, but a scan of the gathered gulls drew a blank and with Sunday dinner in the oven I drove home having missed another scarce gull at Sutton Bingham this year.

Just after dishing up I got a call from Pete saying the Iceland Gull was back, so leaving the family to eat dinner and throwing mine in the oven I headed back and made straight for the Fishing Lodge where according to Pete's info I should get a better view as it was very distant from the northern causeway. Just as I arrived all the gulls went up and what followed was a manic few minutes as I tried to find it whilst talking to Pete on the phone.

Eventually I got lucky and over the next thirty minutes or so got some decent views, albeit in deteriorating light.

And here's one of the above images that I managed to brighten up a little bit.

What a relief! I've been lucky enough to find four Iceland Gulls at Sutton Bingham over the years and it is such a scarce bird on patch I would have been gutted to have missed it, but thanks to Pete's help, I was successful.

Sutton Bingham year list for 2022 now at 72 species.