Fifty years ago
Nature Trail by Malcolm Palmer
I try to look back early each year, and 1970 was my last year living in my native Yorkshire, before that fourletter-word, work, took me to live in Kent.
My then wife and I took a car and camping trip down through France at the end of April. I remember a fine Short-toed Eagle carrying a snake in the Ardeche, and Eagle Owls calling as we camped in the Gorge du Tarn. We called on my friend John
Walmsley, (with whom I spoke, incidentally, last week) who was working in the Camargue. A raging mistral, that cold wind from the Alps, blew, but when it dropped, a day or two later, migrants abounded.
Wood, Green and Marsh Sandpipers were present in flocks, and small birds included many warblers, Whinchat, Ortolan Buntings, Redstarts, and a Ring Ouzel. A huge flock of Bee Eaters came in noisily off the sea. Eventually we made our way back home through Switzerland.
Later in the year, after a few farewell visits to Spurn Point, I made the annual ‘pilgrimage’ to the Scillies, staying in a cottage on St Agnes. When the northwesterly wind started to strengthen, my attention was drawn to a plump, streaky little bird about the size of a Meadow Pipit.
Having caught one on Bardsey two years previously
I had no hesitation in identifying a Blackpoll Warbler – then only the third British record of the American vagrant. In those old days of ringing ‘free-for-all’ I had nets with me, and we subsequently caught and ringed it, confirming the identification. I spent the rest of the year preparing to move down to my new home.
Should you have anything to report, or any queries, do contact me, at malcaves@yahoo.es