Sunday 22 March 2015

Who stole our Whoopers..............

Iceland Gull, 60 Whooper Swans and 3 Scaup passed Whitburn by midday. Both Marks were back for more and in totally different conditions to yesterdays northerly we had another superb sea watch. I called the Iceland Gull early on and it was the 7th past the obs this year. Whooper Swans began to move and groups of 7, 8, 37, and 8 went north giving us a decent day total of 60. Then came news from Chris Bell that at least a further 75 had just gone north past Hartlepool. That number would put us close to the day record of 137 passed Whitburn, so we waited and waited and.......
We have had 368 Whoopers logged so far this year a new record year total.
This is what we saw in order of appearance

Sunday 22nd March 05.45-12.00 SW2 light cloud

Curlew 36n 3s
Black h Gull 133n 13s
Guillemot 700n
Razorbill 210n
Puffin 1n
Common Gull 36n 9s
Gannet 155n 4s
Goosander 1n
Iceland Gull 1n juv 06.13
Eider 10n 19s
Red th Diver 3n 12s
Common Scoter 6n 4s
Wigeon 2n
Shag 4n 2s
Whooper Swan 60n
Red br Merganser 1n
Great cr Grebe 1n and 1 on sea
Velvet Scoter 4n
Scaup 3n
Porpoise 2n
Redshank 5n
Kestrel 1s
and a Blue Fulmar north