Patchwork Challenge

My patch at Hawes in North Yorkshire is the upper reaches of the River Ure in the Yorkshire Dales. Habitat is obviously the river itself, together with its surrounding farmland (sheep and cattle-grazed pasture and meadowland), together with tiny pockets of deciduous-dominated mixed woodland, and an odd dwelling here and there. After periods of heavy rain, particularly in winter, added interest can be found when the fields can flood extensively, potentially increasing species diversity. With the site lying c230 mtr a.s.l and c30 miles from the nearest coast, the all-time species list is 126, modest compared with lower-lying coastal patches, but fairly decent non-the-less for the upland, inland location. Jan 1 arrived, and with it my first crack at PWC. Some flood water was covering the pastures, and so helpfully, Wigeon , Teal and Snipe could be added. Grey Wagtail got banged on the list, and I gratefully received Pied Wagtail . Uncommon on patch in winter, more so than Grey, ...

Stobswood is a site of perpetual change and is at present still in process of recovering from the opencast that adorned the site only a few years past. As time advances it appears the site is becoming of greater value to bird life; a fact well demonstrated by my comparative score for 2014, smashing my previous best my a rather nifty 130%. As I say, this is due in the large part to the site maturing though extending “the patch” boundaries to incorporate the new lake at Widdrington Village undoubtedly aided my cause. Combining the ex-opencast last, the new lake and the woodland surrounding my house I managed a respectable 126 species and 143 points. Not bad for a site branded a “wasteland” by some of the less avian orientated locals. This was far from a winning score and in the end landed me bang smack in the middle of the inland north table, where I stand content having given it my all in 2014 and noted some truly exciting species. January/February The New Year started rather...

I patchwork in urban North Leeds and I know that I will probably never find a National rarity and thus get mega points and a chance at the top points spot. However that wasn't the main reason for me joining Patchwork Challenge last year, for me the big attraction was the Comparative Minieague. This is where you compete against yourself, or rather last year's version of yourself. Can you see as many birds and score as many points as you did in previous years? This levels the playing field somewhat and allows the birder with a relatively poor patch (like me) to compete with the lucky birders at hotspots such as Spurn Point, Cley or Portland Bill. Last year my final tally of 67 species gave me 69 points, which was a higher count than my records going back 20+ years indicated I should expect. So there's my target for 2015 - beat 69 point. So far from 3 visits I've amassed over 60% of last year's total so there's every hope that I will have a healthy 10...

Having come across Patchwork Challenge too late in 2013 (though I did keep a score for my own benefit and recorded 102 species and would’ve scored 120 points) I made sure I was signed up for 2014. Having a young family had curtailed much travelling for birds so instead I took the opportunity to concentrate on Sutton Bingham Reservoir (SBR), my local patch for over fifteen years. SBR has attracted some cracking birds over the years, especially in the 70’s and early 80’s…before it became my patch I hasten to add, but nowadays high water levels year round have put pay to wader passage and wildfowl numbers have dramatically reduced over the past decade. January The year started off much better than I could ever have imagined when during my first visit of the year, on 3rd, I found a Yellow-browed Warbler! This was only the second patch record, I had found the first in October 2013 in a private area of the reservoir. This bird though would be accessible to all, and attracted a fair fe...

The midlands has a large number of competitors for whom 2014 was their first year in the competition. So the final scores this year will be the comparative for next. Ian Cowgill at Lound wins the Midlands title for 2014. Lound is a place quite close to my heart as it was my local patch in the early 90's so it is great to see it breaking the 200 points mark for the year. John Hopper has pulled away in second whilst Andy Mackay makes up the top 3 at Eyebrook. It has been a very competitive league this year as the scores testify with a number of sites running each other very close. It is good to see a number of competitors submitting to BirdTrack, with Andy Sims in particular putting in an impressive 9621 records and 261 complete lists. It is very straightforward to do and really adds to the patch birding experience. December saw a number of birds of note appearing at midlands sites. Perhaps most of all was a Reed Warbler on the last day of the year at Marston Sewage Works. Only w...

The Birdtrack Birdrace is changing a little this year. Complete lists are the best source of information for the BTO so the winner this year will be the person who manages to submit the most complete lists on patch to Birdtrack. I use the Birdtrack app for iPhone to do this in the field and there is also an android version of the app. Additionally you can enter the data via the website: At the end of each month we need to know how many records and how many complete lists you have recorded for your patch. This list is cumulative i.e. your running total for 2015. Nick Moran explains how to get your details up below. "1. Click 'Explore my records' 2. Click 'Select a year' (it will default to the current year, i.e. 2015) 3. Tick 'Locations' 4. Click 'Specific locations' 5. Shift+click your PWC sites (I have named mine with a prefix '15PC' so that they always appear at the top) 6. Click 'GO' 7. Read off totals from the top...

Last year saw myself and Ben Porter take part in the 2014 patchwork challenge. 2014 proved to be an excellent year for the island with higher than usual number of species recorded (averaging approximately 170 species per year) and a good scattering of rarities amongst them. Being pretty much as far away from the east coast of England as you possibly can get, Bardsey is never going to be able to compete with the likes of Spurn or Flamborough, North Ronaldsay or Fair Isle for number of species recorded in a year or the selection of rarities that these sites get. However we do our very best to try and keep up with the big guns...  Ben got off to a good start being on the island over the winter months and I didn't get back until early March. However, I was soon able to start collecting points and species which Ben had managed to get in the first three months of the year. By Mid-summer we were pretty much neck and neck, however Ben’s departure for him to sit is A-l...

Peter Donelly on North Ronaldsay wins the Coastal Scotland Minileague but only by the skin of his teeth as John Bowlers excellent year continues until the very end. John managed a PPB of 2.027 to go to the wire but the excellent autumn that Peter had sealed the deal. Gary Bell at Sumburgh finishes third 16 points clear of local rival Steve Minton at Scatness. Former PWC stalwart Mark 'dead to us' Lewis finishes as the leading mainland Scotland patcher on a respectable 224 points beating Dan Brown at Dunnet. Some Taiga Beans on the Isle of the May were first records for the island and the outstanding December record for Mark Newell. John Bowler managed a huge score in 2013 so to defeat by such a large margin makes him a more than worthy winner of the Coastal Scotland comparative minileague with 122%. Andrew Whitehouse pushed him close finishing on 117% with Stephen Welch in third on 116%. Just missing out was Dave W on Burray on 114%. Mark Newell is the sixth 100%er in C...

There was nothing of note found in the Coastal North in December which means long time leader Tim Jones not only wins the minileague but also the overall points total, NGB minileague and all round good guy competition. Great job Tim and a shame that you arent able to defend SBO's honour in 2015. Tim had managed to add Blackpoll Warbler in November thanks to a bird in Mick Turtons garden. Martin Garner finishes second with a 91 point lead over third placed Jane Turner. Chris Bradshaw sneaks in ahead of Iain Robson who despite a very decent year cant quite hold onto fourth. Jack Bucknall manages to overtake his Northumbrian compatriate, Tom Cadwallender showing that sometimes youth does beat experience. Iain wins the comparative minileague witha hefty 112% although nobody else managed to hit the 100% mark with both Jane and James coming close.

It went to the wire in another hotly contested minileague and Ben Lewis managed to equal eventual winner, Jamie Wells' November score but Jamie managed a further seven points sealing the victory for Paxton Pits. Steve Swinney had third place wrapped up for a while but it was a great effort at Linford. Emma Webb managed to gain two places in December and climb to 9th with the Birdtrack guru Nick Moran rounding off the Top 10. Ben and Alison finished joint 12th (although through a quirk of table sorting Ben appears to be both above Alison and yet 13th simultaneously... A strong finish by Jake Gearty sees him jump up four spots in the final standings.   First to eighth place remain as they were from November so congratulations must go out to Steve Swinney for winning the comparative table. A huge 142% score and a big points improvement. Mark Nowers finishes second and Jim Bradley rounds off the podium places. There were no new additions to the 100% club but great work for the...