A surprise sighting
Backlit Curlews at full speed up River Erme as the tide goes out in early morning
A fortnight ago I had the pleasure of visiting friends on the Erme estuary in Devon, England. I decided to pack my 800mm lens and use the opportunity to catch a couple of hours of photography along the mouth of the river. This beautiful part of the world is teeming with birdlife. I observed many waders, ducks, gulls, buzzards, house martins, cattle egret, little egret, great white egret, a grebe, a kingfisher, and a green woodpecker among many of the usual passerines.
A Green Woodpecker in lovely morning glow
One priority was to photograph Curlews on the mudflats - to catch them feeding in gorgeous autumn light. Sitting quietly on the edge of the water, I spotted in the distance what I assumed to be two Curlews, with their distinct long beaks. The birds moved closer and closer. I captured a few initial images and studied the results in my viewfinder. I hesitated as the birds looked rather brownish … not at all the colour of a Curlew. I could not think of any other bird so similar in size and shape to the Curlew in the UK.
Clearly not a Curlew, but what is it?
A bit stumped, I fished out my iPhone and took a quick photo of the bird displayed on the low-resolution screen at the back of my camera. I fed the photo into the Merlin App and it provided only one suggestion: A Glossy Ibis. Nah?! Not here in England? And the Merlin App seemed to agree, as its maps suggested that the Glossy’s range did not extend as far north as the UK. Intrigued, I now suspected this was a rare sighting, so I re-focused my attention on capturing images of these rather elegant birds. A positive identification could wait.
A Glossy Ibis enjoying the mudflats on the River Erme
The next day, back home in front of the computer I could confirm that it was indeed a Glossy Ibis. A new bird to add to my list of Ibis images (African Sacred Ibis, Australian Ibis, Green Ibis, Hadada Ibis, White Ibis). Not only a new bird to add to my list, but one photographed in a surprising location. Or maybe not so … after a bit of googling, it seems the Glossy Ibis has recently become a visitor to the UK. Indeed, a first recorded breeding in England was in 2022, and this September a couple of hundred sightings have been made. When a couple of birds were observed in Gloucestershire in 2007 it was considered a complete aberration. My RSPB Britain’s Bird book published in 2016 has this to say: “Rare migrant/winter visitor from SW Europe, sometimes small groups, mostly in S[outh]; increasing”. A bird more commonly found around the Mediterranean is most likely expanding its range north as the Med is becoming drier in summers and winters in the UK milder.
I almost didn’t bring my camera and long lens on this weekend trip as photography wasn’t really the aim of our visit, but in this case I’m glad I did. What a pleasant surprise 😊