With bright weather persisting I found myself in East Yorkshire, more specifically in Bridlington, with a few hours to spare after breakfast. The tide was falling so it was a good time to check out the birds feeding on the rocks at the base of the harbour’s southern wall, a regular site for finding Purple Sandpiper in the autumn. Large numbers of gulls were feeding in the shallows and water’s edge with plenty of shorebirds foraging in the area too and I was able to get very close to them by walking very slowly and not making any sharp movements, as well as getting slightly wet feet. This gave me an hour and a half to observe 6 Purple Sandpipers along with several other species at extremely close range and take a lot of photographs, some of which turned out nicely.

Purple Sandpiper was my main target at Bridlington so I was very happy to spot several of them on the rocks at the base of the harbour wall as the tide was falling. With a little fieldcraft it was not too hard to get quite close to them and get incredible views of these attractive waders in wonderful sunlight. This is a species that is a scarce winter visitor in UK and one that I do not get to see very often so it was great to be able to watch them without being rushed.

It is always nice to see new birds of course but being able to watch any bird this close up is something I enjoy a lot. It gives a chance to see the fine details in the plumage as well as to observe their behaviour which is often comical and frequently intolerant of other birds of both the same and other species. I watched at least 6 Purple Sandpipers at a range of just  about 3 metres but as I stopped peering through my camera I noticed that I was surrounded by Ruddy Turnstones feeding on dead crabs on the sand around me. It was amazing how close they came to me with on almost running between my feet!

I like these birds a lot, they are always busy and full of character. Bridlington harbour is a very good place to see them at close-quarters in autumn and winter.

There was a large amount of bird activity in a small area next to the harbour wall where there were lots of dead crabs, seemingly discarded by fishermen possibly taking only the parts full of meat. Turnstones, Herring Gulls, Great Black-backed Gulls and Oystercatchers were squabbling over the spoils.

One of my favourite birds is Oystercatcher, another species full of character, so that getting close to a few of them was great. It was interesting to notice that they came quite close to me when I was concentrating on other species but as soon as I turned my attention to them they would quickly back off.

The only other wader species I saw was Common Redshank and there were a lot of these on the mud within the harbour as the tide went out. When the tide is in there is usually a group of Redshank roosting on the wall right behind the harbour admin building at the end of the southern wall.

Looking out to sea there were also quite large numbers of Kittiwakes as well as 2 Common Scoters, 1 Great Crested Grebe, 2 Red-throated Divers and many Gannets. All of these were nice but my attention went back to the Purple Sandpipers until it was time to leave.

This individual was kind enough to give me this chance to capture it in this classic pose as it stretched just a few metres away from me.