Wildlife

James Lowen

Egyptian Geese were everywhere too, leading me to wonder whether Dutch birds might be a source for the ever-spreading UK population. Back on the mainland, the flocks of geese continued – large numbers grazing beside the motorway we were cruising along: the Netherlands seems to favour maintaining decent habitat in a way that we don’t in the UK. Small waterbodies held perhaps a dozen Smew, including several fine drakes. We finished at dusk on the edge of a genuinely classy housing estate, our target a drake Baikal Teal. Sadly, darkness fell before we could locate it. But that was the only minor downer on an excellent break: one that boosted spirits amid the winter doldrums, and that provided a restful experience without overly traumatising the bank balance.

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9 February 2025 Goose spectacle

A fortnight ago, I was coaxed from various quarters into twitching the Dutch Spectacled Eider. Initially, I was sceptical about the provenance of this bird, the first of its species to be recorded south of the Arctic Circle. But as the days passed, and neither wings nor abraded wings were seen, my reasons for not going - and saving £1000s on seeing it at Barrow, Alaska - became ever smaller. Accordingly, Dave Andrews, Dave Capper, Phil Saunders and I took took the Harwich ferry to Hook of Holland, drove 2 hours north to Den Helder, took a small ferry across to Texel, and had a great day's birding. After a bit of a walk, the Eider was soon on show, and - although never close enough for decent photos - eventually gave excellent scope views. What a sensational bird. Also mesmerising was the nature of the crowd of visiting twitchers, which contained folk from at least eight countries. This is surely the biggest all-time Eurotwitch, with significant crowds even yesterday.

The other amazing thing about Texel was the quantity and diversity of grazing geese. One field had five wild species in it, nibbling grass side-by-side: Barnacle, Brent, Greater White-fronted, Tundra Bean and Greylag.

Another field had nigh on a thousand Tundra Bean Goose in it. I suspect that if you added all the Beans I’ve seen, in Estonia and the UK, you wouldn’t reach the number we saw on Texel in a single afternoon.