Another Yank passerine and a national mega

As the Icelandic Olympic birding team headed to south-east Iceland straight from the ferry on Sunday night, I was left to get up before first light to try and find yesterday's Blackpoll Warbler Dendroica striata in Þorlákshöfn on my own before work. Arrived at the scene just as it was getting light, and soon saw a small yellow bird at the spot where the warbler had been seen yesterday, but inexplicably lost the bird again, without seeing where it possibly could have gone. There began a long search, with one eye on the clock as I was due at work in ten minutes in a town 50 minutes away. I walked the park about six times and then the two most promosing streets in Þorlákshöfn , where I'd previously seen Rose-breasted Grosbeak, Barred Warbler, Pied Flycatcher to name a few. But the streets were birdless apart from the local Redwings Turdus iliacus, Icelandic Redpolls Carduelis flammea islandica and Winter Wrens Troglodytes troglodytes.

But there was nothing else to be done, already late for work, I had to give up on the dendroica. You win some, you lose some. I walked back to the car and decided on my way out of town to drive slowly down the street again, a last desperate cast of the dice. And amazingly from the car I spotted some movement in a tree, got out lifted my binoculars and saw my first ever Blackpoll Warbler Dendroica striata, and my fifth dendroica in Iceland. Couldn't believe my luck. At that point SÁ rang me with news that they'd just found a Yellow-rumped Warbler. In fact the phone didin't stop ringing all day, as they also found a Blackpoll Warbler, a Gray-cheeked Thrush, Iceland's first Goldfinch just to name a few. A vintage day I think is what you'd call it. Shame I had other commitments that stopped me from going with them, but it was clear that I would be taking a holiday the following day.

Picked DB up at 7:00 a.m. and drove to the Eyjafjöll area (see entry for 1-2 October), which hadn't had any coverage but must have some birds. First stop was Kverkin, where we found the Alder Flycatcher two years ago. Nothing as spectacular this time but six Blackcaps Sylvia atricapilla and a Common Chiffchaff Phylloscopus collybita was evidence that there were vagrants around. Then a red-tailed bird flew past, my first ever Icelandic Common Redstart Phoenicurus phoenicurus, an Iceland tick for both of us at the first stop! The next door farm had truly spectacular numbers of Redwings Turdus iliacus in the garden and on all the meadows, and the frequent attention of a Merlin Falco columbarius induced panic and caused flocks of Redwings to crash noisily into the garden at regular intervals. But the morning was about to get really interesting. The farmer came out and told me that she'd seen a very strange bird in her garden just three days earlier, like a Whimbrel but black. What's more she'd taken a photo of it. I looked at DB and asked if he was thinking what I was thinking. Apparently he was. The photo revealed a Glossy Ibis Plegadis falcinellus, and two weeks earlier a bird matching the description had been described at sea 30 miles south of here. Glossy Ibis was last seen in Iceland in 1998, and before that 1824, so it's a huge rarity in these parts. We told the farmer what it was and bemoaned the fact that we hadn't been here three days earlier as it hadn't been seen since. Oh, well at least we had proof that it had been here, for the records. DB and I decided to split up, he went round one side of the barn and I went round the other. I gazed across the field, imagining how great it would to see the ibis now. After a minute my mobile rang and it's DB, "DID YOU SEE IT? DID YOU SEE IT? It circled round your head about five times!" Somehow I hadn't managed to see it circling round my head five times, I must remember to look up more often, and when I joined DB, he was looking at a superb Glossy Ibis Plegadis falcinellus in a ditch. Seeing this bird fly round with Ravens Corvus corax and fly in front of the high waterfalls which feed off the ice-cap is probably the strangest thing I've seen whilst birding in Iceland, and slightly different to my previous sightings of this species in Spain and Australia. The day was bound to be an anti-climax after that, although two delightful Yellow-browed Warblers Phylloscopus inornatus amongst commoner vagrants were very nice finds. And I never tire of visiting this area of high cascades, and quite simply magnificent views of the hulking ice-cap Eyjafjallajökull rising above the tiny farms, only two hours from Reykjavík.