Wednesday 13 July 2016

It's a mystery it's a .....

Great northern Diver and 2 Arctic Skua's passed Whitburn Obs by 07.15 this morning. The identity of three of the birds i saw this morning is a bit of a mystery as Toyah would say. A large juv gull looked all biscuit in colour with no contrast but sadly it was flying east towards a distant trawler. One of my Arctic Skua's looked a little long winged but was mega distant..and finally the sum plum large diver going south was in all probability a Great northern but it dropped from high and i only got views of it going south, it's a mystery...but life would be boring if everything was straight forward.
After a very quiet start passage picked up today and another pair of eyes would have helped, this is what i saw in order of appearance

Wednesday 13th July 04.30-07.15

Swift 1s
Common Gull 2n 3s
Sandwich Tern 18n 103s a couple were fledgelings
Common Tern 7n 17s
Gannet 525n 19s
Manxie 37n
Puffin 17n
Common Scoter 40n
Black h Gull 2n 1s
Arctic Tern 3n 7s
Whimbrel 7n 3s
Redshank 8n
LBBGull 2s
Curlew 2n
Great northern Diver sum plum 1s 06.25
Arctic Skua 1n 1s