Monday 23 April 2012

Record flock of Arctic Skua

Heysham Obs
By far the best sighting this morning was a flock of 12 Arctic Skua at 1030hrs (10 dark morph and one light morph) which spiralled high into the sky and "disappeared" to the north!

Next best was two Garden Warbler in Smithy Wood.  As for the rest, it was progressively worse the earlier in the morning i.e. could have had a lie-in

Office area
Dead first thing with a huge wadge of cloud to the south
Lesser Redpoll - 1 ringed
Chiffchaff - two ringed
Willow Warbler - NO migrants!!
Meadow Pipit - 1+6 NE

Other landbirds
Siskin - 3 Smithy Wood, then NE
Garden Warbler - 2

North harbour wall
Sandwich Tern - 27 first thing (no Arctic Tern this morning)
Arctic Skua - 12 as above
Gannet - 4
Kittiwake - 2 on sea
Shag - one 2CY still around
Turnstone - 117+

Middleton NR
Nothing new

Thanks for these, Janet (from Middleton)


Moths
That epitome of evolutionary mediocrity, Brown House Moth, opened its account