From the Archives - Cream coloured Courser in Herefordshire 21st May 2012

I went to bed early on Sunday the 20th of May trying to be excited about a day outing to France with Chris the next day, Monday. The star attraction was going to be breeding Stone Curlews. Why I agreed to it I cannot quite remember but it must have been a mild aberration on my part as here in Oxfordshire there are also breeding pairs of Stone Curlews. Still it was a day out birding in good company and not working.

My enthusiasm was further dampened by the fact I had to get up very early at 1am to be in Seaford East Sussex by 4am in order to meet Chris and my fellow Francophile birders, so it was an early bedtime for me. I do not know why I bother going to bed in such situations as I do not sleep, due to a combination of excitement (but not in this case) and worry that the alarm will not go off (it has never failed me so far). with the result that any thoughts of slumber are firmly put paid to.

Lying in bed and trying to convince myself that I was going to get some sleep my mobile alerted me to a text message. It was from Badger. He had sent me a copy of a Mega Alert! At 11pm at night? It must be an owl? Three magic words immediately banished any idea of sleep or owls. Cream Coloured Courser! I looked in trepidation as to where it might be. The Isles of Scilly? Cornwall? The Outer Hebrides? Or some other location requiring a long drive and heroic logistics? No, it was in Hereford on a golf course at a place called Kington. This was but two hours drive from my home and consequently irresistible. Now totally awake, France was consigned to oblivion. 

I sent a text back to Badger. Are you going for it? A text immediately pings back to me, Yes, tomorrow morning. I text back. Do you want company? Another short text from Badger. Yes.

By now it was 1130pm. I sent a text to Chris advising I cannot come to France but I am racked by concern as to whether Chris will get the text in time. There is no immediate reply from Chris and I lay awake worrying about this whilst at the same time getting increasingly excited at the prospect of seeing a Cream Coloured Courser. A lifer and consequently my first ever in Britain. I hoped that Chris got my text, it was too late to call him, but even more I hoped I would get to see the courser tomorrow. I call Badger, who was still obviously awake at this late hour, to finalise our meeting arrangements for tomorrow and am pleasantly surprised to find we will not be heading off on a dawn patrol of a golf course but will wait until definite news comes through tomorrow morning. Badger would call me at 7am and provided the bird was still there we would head west. I fell into a light sleep. My phone alarm went off half an hour later at 1am. Darn. In my excitement I forgot to turn it off. Mrs U is far from happy. I lay back on the pillows and manage some sleep. Two hours later my text alarm wakes me yet again, at 3am, with Chris informing me he is OK about my cancelling France. Mrs U banishes me  and the phone to another bedroom.

I cannot get back to sleep and read a crime fiction novel that does not include anything about birds. I wake up at 6am having fallen asleep reading. I stagger into my study and turn on the computer to consult Birdguides and see to my amazement that the courser is still present but even more amazing is that some poor unfortunate who also has problems sleeping and probably is not married has seen the courser at 4.45am this very morning and posted the news!

I take a chance and call Badger at 6.30am and tell him the news. We arrange to meet in the Little Chef car park by the A40 at Burford at 7am and a little woozy from lack of sleep, on a cold grey windy morning I make a rendezvous with Badger. I piled my stuff into Badger's Skoda and off we go down the A40. It's all a bit surreal, what with the lack of sleep and driving on roads in the rush hour, normally traversed in situations such as this, in the middle of the night. Slowly as we head west the weather improves and by the time we get to the M5 Motorway it is sunny and the wind has dropped. It's looking good. We turn off the motorway and continue westwards on what seems a never ending road heading for the Land of Leeks.We stop for some sustenance at a garage near Worcester then off we go again, eventually arriving at Kington and with comparative ease find the very narrow road leading uphill to the golf course.

We meet several cars coming down a road that is only wide enough for one car. Reversing and polite waves come into play before we finally get to the clubhouse and drive uphill beyond it to find the designated parking area. We proceed by foot on a hilly and hazardous route though gorse bushes, golfers and flying golf balls. I note how other birders abandon wives in their wake as they allow adrenalin and anxiety to overtake courtesy and years of marriage. We reach the brow of a hill and there, arraigned before us, is a line of around fifty birders.

We join the end of the line and an upright, pale sandy coloured bird parades up and down before us on the eighth fairway. Several puns come to mind. 'A birdy on the eighth fairway' or 'It's a fairway to Hereford.' It is a harmless release of tension and allows the adrenalin to run its course as I relax.

Here it was. A Cream Coloured Courser at last. I should have seen one on Scilly but by the time I got my act together it had died. This was a second chance to see this mega and the resultant success made life very sweet indeed.

The object of our pilgrimage was larger than I had expected, close to a Golden Plover in size. I had assumed it would be similar to the various species of coursers I had seen in southern Africa such as Temminck's Courser which is smaller and more delicate. The Cream Coloured Courser was a real charmer with striking black and white chevrons on the back of its neck and a dove grey skull cap. The rest of the body was all over sandy buff, supported on incongruous white legs.

All those present, worshipping this star bird from North Africa, kept a discrete and reasonable distance from it, although given half a chance I am sure there were some who would have ventured closer, only being deterred by the knowledge that they would incur the approbation of the crowd if they strayed too close. The courser showed little fear of the regular groups of golfers coming down the fairway, running into the rough to let them pass and then re-emerging onto the fairway to strut its stuff. It fed by bending down on stiff legs to pick prey from the ground and then quickly ran short distances between feeding, much like a plover. Up and down it went on the fairway always contriving to remain within an area of a couple of hundred metres.

An absolute beauty, we watched it for two hours with the awesome scenery of Hergest Ridge and the Welsh border as a background. Kington is the highest golf course in England and in my opinion a suitably beautiful venue for such a star bird to make an appearance.

And what of France you might ask? Well apparently fog put paid to any birding until lunchtime and nothing exceptional was seen although Chris and friends managed to see 87 species of bird. There was, however, only one species of bird for me and that was definitely not in France!