Serins at Fen Drayton RSPB, Cambridgeshire

A dodgy photo (with more to follow) of one of the two Serins that have been frequenting Fen Drayton RSPB reserve in Cambridgeshire for the past couple of weeks, although the news only became common knowledge this Monday for whatever reason.

Another day, another 'lifer', that's two in less than a week! These small finches are pretty common in Europe and they do turn up in the UK every year, although a freezing cold January is not the usual time to find one, let alone two. They gave myself and Chris Orders the run around this morning, even leading us to leave the site thinking that they had gone, only to be called back by a kindly chap who had taken Chris's number. We were treated to okay views, with the two birds quite happily feeding extremely closely to the guided busway, but they were constantly obscured in some way. They flew after approximately ten minutes and after another view through a hawthorn bush and another flight view, we left, this time for good.

Baikal Teal at Fen Drayton RSPB

A very dodgy 'record' digiscoped shot of a potentially dodgy bird at the RSPB reserve of Fen Drayton lakes in Cambridgeshire. A quote from the Collins Bird Guide 2nd edition "Very rarely seen in Europe and arguably doubtful whether any record involves a genuine straggler". This, however has not stopped a number of people (including myself) making the trip along the A14 in order to get a glimpse of this bird that is normally found in Russia and East Asia.

After a 30 minute walk from the car park Lisa and myself arrived at the birds location and was soon put onto it by a fellow birder. It was rather a long way away to put it mildly and we were told that it was closer from the hide where we walked to next. On entering the hide we were greeted by a handful of birders and the bird was indeed nearer, but still at least a few hundred metres away! We settled down in anticipation of it coming a bit nearer. It didn't, hence the digiscoped shot above and this even more dodgy shot from my DSLR

The bird was seen out of the water at one point and does not appear to have any rings and there doesn't appear to be any damage to wings or other plumage that can be attributed to an escapee (this breed is very popular in wildfowl collections and often escapes). Time will tell whether it is accepted as a truly wild bird, but whatever the outcome, it is most definitely a 'cracking' example of a male duck in all its' breeding finery.