Sunday 6 July 2014

Autumn arrives....

A Red necked Grebe and 360 Manxies went north past Whitburn Obs by 9 am this morning. The chill in the air and the first Red necked Grebe of the autumn confirmed summer is waning. I was joined by New Mark and Magic Mark on a busy watch with record counts for the year of Manx Shearwaters and Sandwich Terns. Juvenile Sandwich, and Arctic Terns were seen as well as our first juv Black headed Gulls
We managed to connect with some White beaked Dolphins on a calm sea, not bad for early Sunday morning. This is what we saw in order of appearance

Sunday 6th July 04.55-09.00 W1 cloud cover and early heat haze

Sandwich Tern 70n 708s inc 1 juv
Common Tern 15n 86s
Puffin 14n 23s
Common Gull 3s
Black headed Gull 2n 10s inc 2 juvs
Manx Shearwater 360n
Common Scoter36n 9s
Red th Diver 1n 4s
Curlew 1n 4s
Porpoise 1n 1s
Redshank 19s
Dunlin 1s
07.50 White beaked Dolphin 4 slowly south till 08.30 at least
Ringed Plover 1n
Arctic Tern 1n juv
Red necked Grebe 1n