Still some good stuff, but not easy

The wind shifted from east to south over the day, quite fresh at times. High cloud with sunny spells.

Seawatch report from Pete (M):

Sample hour seawatch 0620-0720 Heysham 

Really tricky with 1/2 horizon scope maybe not the best strategy. Eg dark Arctic Skua picked up right at the top of the field of view then circled up in situ then NE, 12 Arctic tern only noticed heading inland high above the harbour on a short rest from the scope.  

In the scope view: 

6 distant Gannet, 

1 Red Throated Diver 

4 Guillemot

two distant auk which may have been yet more Puffin but too far away.

13 Sandwich tern (4 blogging)

5 Common Scoter

After that 2cy Shag fishing on dropping tide by yellow buoys

c15 swallow 

2 house martin N.  

750 large gulls and 3 Great Crested Grebe  skear area

Middleton Nature Reserve 

Ringing report from Alan:

Nets set on both East and West sides this morning. A modest catch comprised the following:

Reed Warbler  1 plus 1 retrap

Willow Warbler  1 retrap

Reed Bunting  1 retrap

Sedge Warbler  2 plus 1 retrap

Lesser Whitethroat  2

Goldfinch  3

Long tailed Tit  1 retrap

Lesser Redpoll  8

A trickle of Swallows flew northwards through the reserve.

Heysham skear - low water 11:20 (MD)

The most notable thing today was the complete lack of small waders, apart from the Oystercatchers there were only Whimbrel 1, Curlew 4

Eider 33 - numbers are reducing now, the few remaining mature females are receiving plenty of "interest", the single female in the lead group here surrounded by 10 males.

Red-breasted Merganser 3

Plus the large gulls - a little earlier, Pete Crooks managed to count 790 large gulls (mainly 2nd CY Herring Gull) feeding on the mussel beds on the falling tide