Mega

In bird watching circles a "Mega" is a species which has not yet occurred in the British Isles or is exceedingly rare, or is otherwise highly desirable.

Since retiring we have travelled to see 3 Megas - a Pied-billed Grebe at Hollingworth Lake Country Park, Rochdale, a Lesser White-fronted Goose at Cantley Marshes, Norfolk and a Black Scoter at Bamburgh, Northumberland.

Today we travelled to see our fourth an Oriental (Rufous) Turtle Dove in Steve Akers' back garden at 41 The Leys, Chipping Norton!

The bird has been appearing regularly since February 2011 in the Akers family back garden and Steve Akers, a birder and long-term RSPB member, saw an opportunity to raise some money for a cause he felt strongly about ? the continued illegal slaughter of thousands of birds on Malta. He requested a £5 donation in return for a 10-minute viewing of the bird from his kitchen. The first day over 500 birders turned up with only 15 successfully seeing the bird before it flew off.

With only eight previous British records, the bird was very popular, and over time most who've travelled to see it have been successful and Steve has raised over £3,000 for the cause.

Today we decided to pay it a visit. It tends to be an early morning visitor and Steve was allowing access from 7:30, we arrived around 7:20 and waited quietly outside along with Ian, who'd travelled down from Liverpool and had been there since 6:50. It was a strange setting sitting around Steve's kitchen, hoping the bird would show. Eventually there were 7 of us and eventually the bird put in a very brief appearance at 9:45 but didn't show terribly well. We hung around for another twenty minutes hoping for a better sighting, but eventually thought it best to let Steve have his kitchen back.

On the way back we stopped off at Wilstone Reservoir to do some "proper" bird watching, but standing there being buffeted by a strong cold wind part of me was saying that sitting around in Steve's warm kitchen maybe wasn't that bad after all.

Here are a couple of interesting arcticles on The First Day of Viewing and The Monies Raised.

Afraid I slipped into back-blipping again for yesterday's trip to Lakenheath Fen.