OUESSANT

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I remember when the Field guide to the Rare Birds of Britain and Europe arrived in my house when I was a kid. A book that was crammed full of the rarest of the rare was always going to have a huge appeal to a teenage birder like me, and of course I was instantly struck by Ian Lewington’s stunning plates. I devoured it.

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After a few days of looking at the pictures I realised the book had a lot more to offer, and decided it might be a good idea to actually read some of the text! Underneath the feather by feather descriptions, each species account had a summary of occurrences, and I found myself drawn to this paragraph for the rarest birds. For the very rarest, dates and places for individual sightings were mentioned, and with each of these came a pang of excitement...’Imagine finding one of them!’ With many of them came the same name, over and over again.

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Ouessant.

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In the intervening years I often thought back to Ouessant, and wondered why I never heard anything about it in any of the various birding magazines and websites that I looked at. It seemed to me to be some sort of forgotten island – and I guess from a UK birders perspective it was – but of course the French and other visiting European birders had been knocking the rares in year after year there – we just never got to hear about it over here. Apart from a few French language websites, (which were admittedly dripping with mouth watering photos!) the only readily available information on birding on the island was a piece written for Birding World during it’s very early years. I realised that if I was going to find anything out about this place, I was going to have to do it for myself.

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And so it was that in early October 2007, along with my girlfriend and her family, I made my first journey to Ouessant. I was a little concerned about how I was going to manage the birding holiday/non-birding holiday issue, but it turned out to be quite easy as I’m the only morning person in the group! On more recent trips, I tend to be sociable at meal times and then grab opportunities in between for the rest of the day. Note though that the ‘between mealtimes’ window is shorter in France than in the UK...

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I’ve been visiting Ouessant every Autumn for 11 years now – usually in October, but this year we opted for the first week of September instead. It’s not a big island – under twice the length and breadth of Fair Isle, and yet on every visit, exploring the nooks and crannies of my favoured spots has led me to new areas that deserve as much attention as anywhere else on the island. There really is suitable habitat for migrants and rarities everywhere. From the dense ‘stangs’ in the middle of the island, to the gardens of the holiday homes, via the large areas of Atlantic heath and boggy patches of shrubs dotted around the coast, there is more than enough here to keep the 50 or so visiting birders occupied during peak time. Birds can, and do, turn up anywhere, and quite often reflect the areas getting the best coverage. A nice example of this was one year where I found wryneck, common rosefinch, Richards pipit and rosy starling within a stones throw of the house I was staying in, with my best from elsewhere on the island being ortolan, a few more wryneck and a yellow browed warbler. In fact, most of my better finds (which admittedly don’t hold up in comparison to some of the other stuff I’ve seen when I was there!) have been during grabbed half hours here and there from the house. On the only time I’ve bumped into visiting British birders I was asked where the best spots to go birding were – It was a question I had no answer to at all – the best I could think of was to advise them to just ‘go birding’ and ‘keep birding wherever you are’.

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To me, birding on Ouessant offers the best sort of compromise. I get to spend a fair bit of time on an island where anything can happen, and where there is always some sort of migration going on. As well as that, I get to bird that island on my own terms, with only small numbers of other birders (who are always very pleasant, helpful, and rather humblingly good at speaking English), and, perhaps most importantly, I get to call it a family holiday. You can probably see why I keep going back. There is another reason why I keep returning though...

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I’m still to find that parula....

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To give a flavour of how much fun birding on Ouessant can be, here’s a wee write up of a good day had on Oct 16th, 2016, and another from, funnily enough, October 16th 2018.

2016

When I stuck my head out of the door first thing, I realised that there was barely a breath of wind in the sky, so my tactics were easily decided - I would head down to the NW corner and do some vismigging while checking the cover around Cost ar Reun and Kun. As I cycled across the air was full of thrushes, and on arrival at Pern a couple of stock doves zoomed overhead. Groups of siskin passed over frequently, and a couple of brambling went over with several chaffinches. At Cost ar Reun, the Pallas's warbler put in a very brief appearance, and while I waited for it to show again, a cracking hawfinch 'zeeap'ed overhead. Focussing back on things at ground level, a black redstart flitted across the rooftops and a reed warbler emerged from the brambles. There were birds everywhere. I moved on to Kun where a similar passage of thrushes and finches was visible, but the distinctive call of a redpoll soon had the French birders present raising their bins with some urgency - I hadn't realised that they were pretty uncommon in this part of the world, but thinking back, it was the first time I've recorded one in 9 visits to the island.

I then moved on towards Niou, and en route stopped to look at a group of 5 golden plovers feeding on a stretch of closely cropped grass - and as I did, a small group of crossbills passed invisibly overhead. Niou was drenched in chaffinches and the odd brambling call could be heard among them too, along with the firecrests, thrushes and the like. 

It was too soon time to head back to the house for a spot of late breakfast, but even that couldn't stop the flow of good birds, with 2 yellow-browed warblers in the garden of the house we were staying in, and another hawfinch over Lampaul as I nipped out to the shops. Any time spent outside was done so to an almost constant soundtrack of either siskins, redwings, fieldfares or chaffinches.

After a very hasty lunch I went back out to Stang Porz Gwenn. This brilliant bit of habitat didn't let me down. Again, crests, finches and thrushes dominated, but there were two bits of quality as first yet another hawfinch went over, and then a long-eared owl flushed from a tree at the side of the path. If only I’d seen it before it flushed...

I was happy with the day's haul, so had no problems heading off to spend some family time for a while, with a bike ride down to the Creac'h and then a walk along the coast - I knew of a Siberian stonechat elsewhere on the island and knew I'd have an hour or so to go and have a look at that after the walk. As we cycled down from the Creac'h things started going a little crazy. First up, a drawn out, but abrupt high pitched call appeared in the sky behind me. The brakes were slammed on, and the bird called again (and again, and again....) - a red-throated pipit! A quick text out and I was soon walking along with a couple of French inlaws who were bemused by my high spirits. Not too far along and I got a text that says that the Siberian stonechat is in fact a Caspian! Well that was enough for me to abandon family duties and pedal as fast as I could towards the bird. And what a bird! Seen from a distance it was strikingly pale, and seen from a little closer up, it was simply stunning. A fitting end to the last full day on the island.

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2018

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Another excellent day, with calm and sunny skies for the most part. In the morning I headed out on foot and tried a few spots around Lampaul. In the dark of pre-dawn I picked up one of the three house black redstarts, and there was a little grebe looking self-conscious in amongst the group of mallards in the pretty little port of Lampaul. 

My morning route, once it was light enough, took in various stangs. At Kerhuel, there were two yellow-browed warblers, firecrest and fieldfare, and Stang Korz had a single yellow-brow and two goldcrests (usually these wouldn’t get a mention but crests were thin on the ground this year). Over the road at Stang Porz Gwenn there was a firecrest and siskins overhead, but it didn’t feel like the small stuff was really getting up and going until I got to Prad Meur, at about 10:30. Here, there were two each of goldcrest, firecrest and yellow-browed warbler, and a Cetti’s warbler sang sporadically from the brambles. Perhaps the best of it though was a great spotted woodpecker - a species I’ve only seen once on the island, and one that wasn’t recorded at all in either 2014 or 2015.

It was a little samey but still, terrific fun, made all the more so by the fact that a strong finch passage had kicked off. Groups of siskins and chaffinches moved westward overhead, with the calls of reed bunting and brambling occasionally among them. I went home for lunch thinking I’d already had a good day. 

After a typically protracted lunch, I headed out on the bike towards Plage Yusin. My first stop was at Pennorz, and as I made my over there, the finch passage continued. It felt quiet at Pennorz, and I was about to move on with only a whinchat under my belt when suddenly a small bird landed on a patch of brambles up the path from me. Bins up at the speed of light, and I was looking at a red-breasted flycatcher! It promptly vanished before popping up again further along the path where it sat out in the open for a few minutes, flycatching frequently and showing off its white tail sides very nicely. It was so calm you could even hear the snap of its bill every time it made a grab for something. I put the news out (getting the place name correct at the second attempt…) and left as the group of admirers gathered.

The family were ready to head out so I began again towards Plage Yusin. Here, pipits, wagtails and buntings often feed among the waders on the seaweedy stretch of the tiny little beach. This time it was really quiet, but a 1cy common tern feeding in the bay was a very pleasant surprise - another species I’ve only seen once before here. As we waited for the rest to arrive, I became aware of a familiar call approaching from the east. A Richard’s pipit! it flew over calling, circled the beach allowing me to get some passable record shots, and then cleared off towards the Creac’h - which is exactly what we did once we’d gathered together at Yusin. En route, a dartford warbler ‘chuzzed’ and a yellow-browed warbler called near Niou. 

There are few more scenic parts of the world to enjoy the evening sun, and as a couple of chough circled round, and a sparrowhawk zipped through, I reflected on an excellent day. With rain forecast through the rest of the week, it was good to get one in!