Northumberland - August 2025

I enjoyed a family holiday to the Northumberland coast in mid-August which inevitably included a good amount of birding. It's an area of the country I've never been to before but I am well aware of its birding pedigree so couldn't pass the chance to make the most of it. Based in Shilbottle, a short distance from Alnwick, Alnmouth and Amble allowed me to explore the local area, mostly at the crack of dawn each day. As always for an inland birder, a visit to the coast is an exciting prospect.

There was one stand-out bird for the week, so it makes sense to begin with that. I had checked the birding apps in the days prior to the holiday to get a feel for the best sites not too far from Shilbottle. East Chevington NR, south of Amble, looked a good place to start (it hosted a Grey-headed lapwing in the recent past). It has two lakes a short distance inland from the sea, one more viewable than the other with a few hides. I spent a couple of mornings there and got quite familiar with its layout. The north lake was very water-depleted and held a decent number of the expected waders. Try as I might I couldn't find a Curlew sandpiper that had been present, but mopped up plenty of species for the holiday list. A small area of woodland bordering the reserve was full of Willow warblers and Chiffchaffs, and it was also nice to see a couple of Willow tits. On the evening of 12th August I saw a report of a pratincole species that was seen to land/roost on one of the vegetated bunds on the north lake. It was obviously worth a punt in the morning and I arrived early once again. I was surprised there were only two other birders present when I arrived, but rarities aren't uncommon in this neck of the woods compared to home, so perhaps this explains the relaxed approach from the locals. A couple of hours scanning everything was fruitless. In hindsight, early morning probably wasn't the best time to expect a pratincole to be up and about considering they often hunt flying insects. But it could well have moved on so I wasn't too disheartened. Within an hour of leaving, Birdguides reported a Black-winged pratincole being present! Sods law, but that's how it goes sometimes. I expect it was the few locals I'd spent the early morning with who found it again as it roused and were able to ID it to species level. I could see it was being reported regularly and seemed settled so planned to return later in the day. It helped I knew the layout of the reserve so didn't have to fret about where exactly to go. On the way to the hide, a bloke who seemed to be enjoying his own presence quite emphatically told me it had flown off. Slightly despondent, I walked the short distance to the hide to find he was talking rubbish, the bird was quite obviously there and settled and hadn't gone anywhere. He later came into the hide and clearly had no idea what he was on about or looking at so I found it a very bizarre thing to say to someone. I'm not sure if he was joking or just an idiot. Whichever it was, I didn't really appreciate it!

The bird was distant, sat with a couple of hundred Lapwings on a large area of exposed mud. Strong sunshine meant there was a lot of heat haze, so getting a decent view or photo of it wouldn't be possible. I hadn't seen any images of it on social media up to this point, nor seen any info to confirm how it was identified as a Black-winged. I've previously seen Collared, so was happy it was the rarer cousin. As much as I didn't doubt the ID, it's always nice to be able to satisfy yourself based on your own observations. Sat distantly as it was meant it wasn't possible to say it was anything other than a pratincole. Something then put the whole flock up and I took a few shots of the mass of birds in the hope I'd get it in flight, somewhat in focus. At least then I would be able to see the underwing and have a chance to confirm for myself. Fortunately I did get it in flight and the image below is just about enough to show the dark underwing and lack of a white trailing edge to the secondaries. I've since seen some better flight shots clearly showing the ID features. It departed overnight so no chance for seconds, but a real bonus to be able to see this on the holiday!

I took this image is of the same Lapwing flock earlier in the morning before the pratincole had been re-found. I have been through it to check the pratincole wasn't among them at that point. Thankfully not! I suspect it was on that vegetated island in the middle right of the shot at this stage as that is where it was seen to land the evening before.

A Temminck's stint and Wood sandpiper were the next "best" of the waders during the week, both seen incredibly poorly. The stint was on little more than a muddy puddle in a heavily clodded field adjacent to the beach at Low Newton-by-the-sea. Although it was only about 50 yards away, the light was awful and if you took your eye off it, it was laughably difficult to relocate as it busily moved around on the mud. The Wood sandpiper at Buston Links was on a small pool with a few Green sandpipers and a Greenshank. I thought I heard it call so started audio recording on my phone. It then flushed out of the pool and flew off calling. A quick view in the bins was all I got as it flew yonder. The recording is in the eBird trip report linked below:

https://ebird.org/tripreport/403259

The other rarity that had been reported during the week was an American golden plover at Longhoughton Steel. Again, being a short distance from Shilbottle, I gave it a couple of goes early in the morning when the tide was in. I was able to scan a couple of hundred golden plovers but didn't find it. It seems likely it is the bird that had been present on and off for some time in the area. But, despite not finding the bird, it was a great little area to spend a couple of hours. With the tide in a lot of the waders were pushed onto the adjacent fields. Hundreds of Curlews were present and also hundreds of Ringed plovers. There was also a decent number of Whimbrel a few Black-tailed godwits. A small number of Sanderling and Bar-tailed godwits gave lovely views on the beach. I ended up taking a lot of photos here! I'd hoped for some shearwaters off shore but apart from a couple of Manx, I didn't see any others, but I didn't spent a huge amount of time watching the sea. It seems this week (as I write this blog) has seen more Sooty shearwaters along that coast so I was perhaps a week too early.

View out to sea at Longhoughton Steel.

The species I had wanted to see on the holiday was Roseate tern. A boat trip around Coquet Island provided some great close up views. The trips aren't exactly a pelagic and only an hour long so not set up for birders, and the boat didn't really stop for more than a few minutes at a time. If they added an extra half hour to the trip to pad it out a bit, that would seem better to me, but presumably that's not cost effective and most voyagers are there for the experience above anything else. But I managed to get some decent views and photos of the terns so was very satisfied. I saw a few other Roseates along the coast during the holiday but it was great to see them up close here, and also see a good number of juvenile birds. The trip around the island also gave some nice views of Razorbills and seals as well as Arctic, Common and Sandwich terns. All of the breeding Puffins had since moved on. It's remarkable how over 30000 nest on that island along with everything else, given it's smaller than I expected!

Several times during the week I heard a Quail calling from the fields adjacent to the house in Shilbottle. The northeast of the country is certainly quite reliable for them. I took a walk along one of the footpaths into this area towards a small area of woodland. A small party of Tree sparrows was nice to see given their scarcity at home. A flock of Crossbills briefly landed atop some conifers in the woodland and I just about managed to pap one of them before they moved on out of view. The most bizarre sighting of the holiday came on this walk in the form of a white morph Gyr falcon. I heard some alarm calls and looked up to see a large white bird flying towards me. Initially I thought it was a gull but quickly realised it wasn't. I could see it was fitted with a tracking device as it flew past me relatively closely. I wasn't quick enough to photograph it and it then vanished. I assume it must live somewhere close by and is allowed to fly free and can be tracked in order to go and fetch it. I asked some of the local birders I met if they knew about it, and they seemed to think it was a bird that roams the local area but weren't entirely sure of where it came from.

Overall a lovely area to visit and certainly somewhere I would like to return to. At the peak passage times it must be a great place to go birding! Below are some more shots from the week.

Warkworth beach at sunrise