Steve's Birding And Wildlife Blog.: Tophill visit cut short....and Flamborough Mega,15.04.2013.

With again the prospect of a decent forecast,i planned to spend a full day around the excellent Tophill Low in East York's...how things changed!.I arrived at Tophill nice and early and first of all i checked 'D' res to see if the Ring-necked Duck was still present,but i gave it a pretty good scan and couldn't see him.Birds present included at least 40 Sand Martin,3 Swallow and 2 House Martin taking advantage of all the flying insect prey and on the res itself,36 Goldeneye and a Drake Goosander were seen.I then did what i normally do on my visits and walked around the whole perimeter of the res and including Hempholme Lock.Plenty of warblers were present today around the res and in 'D' res woods and included 5 male Blackcap,3 Willow Warbler and 3 Chiffchaff and overhead the best included an adult male Marsh Harrier,flying south over the fields,2 Yellow Wagtail,4 Redwing,4 Siskin and 14 Lesser Redpoll.On North marsh i looked yet again for Otters,but again didn't see any,but some compensation was had in the form of my first Grass Snake of the year watched swimming across the pool here and in the adjacent scrub a singing male Willow Tit was nice to see and a ghostly Barn Owl was seen on a couple of occasions also.At Hempholme the best bird was a Peregrine flying over to the east,and a single Kingfisher and 2 Sand Martin were seen along the River Hull.I gradually made my way back and then went to look for the Red-necked Grebe on 'O' res.After bumping into fellow birder and photographer Dave Mansell,i picked the bird up distantly sleeping on the res and after speaking to Dave he said it had just caught a large Perch and thus was digesting it.We both went our separate ways until...bang!!,a text message from Karen said there was a Drake Baikal Teal at Flamborough!!.I then got all my camera gear together and dashed back to the car park,telling Dave along the way and we made our way to Flamborough as quick as we could.We got stuck behind every bloody red light,slow driver and roadworks possible,but eventually arrived on site.But the news wasn't good,the bird had flown off towards Old Fall and was on a roadside flash there.More panic ensued until i met a local birder and he said it had just flown back to Northcliffe Marsh...phewee.We all dashed down to the viewing screen and there he was,what a stonking duck!!.I then spent the next 2 hours watching this siberian stunner as it fed and loafed on the small marsh and pools along with 3 Wigeon and 3 Teal.Incidentally,the finder,Flamborough stalwart Brett Richards had seen a 'Funny' duck flypast him while seawatching and went to Northcliffe marsh were he had seen it head,imagine his surprise when he saw what it was..amazing!.This if accepted,will be a new bird for myself and the first record for Yorkshire of this supremely gorgeous duck.After all the excitement i made my way slowly back to the car park at North Landing,taking in the stunning cliff top scenery and seeing a few migrants which included my first Wheatears of the year(1 male and 2 females) and a cracking male White Wagtail,while on the sea 9 Eider were present along with the usual seabirds.So what a day,pretty hectic at times,but i'm a happy boy.