Tuesday 3 May 2016

Decent seawatch considering no showers

Heysham Obs
One "Leicester City moment" following on from the tern scenario last autumn (see 2015 report) - ONE tern was seen this morning - a Little Tern!  The other surprise was the lack of birders - are there really no available midweek birders playing the 'appropriate birding for the weather' card around here (several who do were at work)?   I only saw 6 Gannet and no Kittiwake going in, so presumably missed a shedload of stuff pre-0700 (skuas are on a one-way ticket, unlike u-turning Gannets in these conditions, so no second chance of seeing any you miss going in) - no doubt the bad news will filter in from more dedicated Fleetwood watchers in due course

Sea 0700 (too late!)-0800 and 0830-0911
Bonxie (Great Skua) - one in 0710 - stayed low throughout
Arctic Skua - lm and dm in 0720, then climbed heading towards Humphrey head
Skua spp - very dark presumed dm arctic in at very long range 0745
Gannet - 62 (largest flock 15) out
Kittiwake - 32+7+3+70+28 out
Little Tern - one out 0850
Dunlin - c700 out
Knot - 45 out
Whimbrel - 16 in (one flock)
Red-throated Diver - 2 out
Common Scoter - flock of about 45 blogging distantly
probable Guillemot - one in at long range

Office area
Grasshopper warbler singing in tank farm
Whinchat - male by classroom early pm