Plenty of.........Mallard!

A fresher SE wind. Some weak sunshine in the morning then showers from early evening.

Heysham skear, low water 10:20 (Malcolm)

Eider 67

Red-breasted Merganser 4

Great Crested Grebe 6

Little Egret 2

We have quickly moved back to neap tides and it didn't fully expose the middle skear today. It should have produced a higher concentration of waders, if there had been a higher number of waders to concentrate. There wasn't!

Oystercatcher 350

Knot 220

Dunlin 1

Middleton Nature Reserve (Janet)

Mallard

Moorhen in the bushes 

Silver Y

South shore (Malcolm)

Just a quick look from saltmarsh to Red Nab towards high water,  just as the rain was starting.

Knot 13 - 6 on saltmarsh, 7 on Red Nab

Bar-Tailed Godwit 92 - 77 on saltmarsh, 15 on Red Nab.

Bar-Tailed Godwit and Knot coming in to the saltmarsh 

Godwits and Knot resting by the saltmarsh 

Some of the Knot and Godwits with Oystercatchers on Red Nab

And finally, another Mallard! Slightly unusually on Red Nab. It was raining quite hard now, and he had just climbed out of the freshwater runoff. But he quickly slewed off the excess water.

First day of the Poms

The light SE breeze freshened during the day. Not as much sunshine, but still warm. The predicted thunderstorms began at 18:00, but didn't last long.

Seawatch report by Pete:

1 light morph Pomarine Skua

2 dark morph Arctic Skua on sea 0535hr. The skuas were floating out of the bay when picked up - the two Arctic together and the Pom about 100-150m further in.  Whilst watching the Pom, the two Arctic’s flew over it causing it also to lift off whence it took the lead climbing quite steeply into the sky with all three lost at height when I had to shift the car to try and see.

Also: 

inbound flock of 14 Sandwich Tern - a single purposeful flock of 14 flying in -  no bloggers at all 

1 Canada goose

22 C Scoter

2 Guillemot

19 swallow 

8 Whimbrel

Heysham skear - low water 09:30 (Malcolm)

Eider 63

Common Scoter 1 male initially just drifting on the sea, but began feeding when the tide started making.

Male Common Scoter

Red-breasted Merganser 2

Great Crested Grebe 2

Little Egret 6

Number wise there were very few waders on the middle skear, but more variety than of late.

Oystercatcher 300 (more on the outer skear)

Knot just 1 initially on the skear (more on this later).

The solitary middle skear Knot

Dunlin 2, with....

Ringed Plover 12. 

Turnstone 9 - Their behaviour was different today. They normally freeze in silence when you get close, or fly off calling. But today they froze and made contact calls, clearly unhappy that I was there.

Sanderling 3 - there were two feeding near a Turnstone. This clip begins with the leading Sanderling then a larger wader appears, I knew the original two were of a similar size so, I panned back and the second bird was still there. By size, my first thought was that the third bird was a Knot, but it was another Sanderling, just larger.

They clearly weren't in association and the larger bird disappeared just as quickly as it appeared.

Sanderling 

Knot (continued). I only saw the single Knot on the skear until the tide was moving me off. Then a flock of c2000 was flying above me. I assumed (and still do) that they had been moved off the outer skear. As I watched them two more flocks totalling c700 were very high above them. These dropped down and they all milled around a while before c700 landed on the skear and the rest headed off to the south. It looks as though those that landed were newly arriving birds, as all they did was rest and preen.

Heysham Nature Reserve 

Ringing report by Alan.

Four mist nets set at Heysham NR this morning from 05.45 onwards produced a particularly unremarkable catch.  There was plenty of song from birds presumably on, or setting up, territories but few birds moving around.  

Robin  1 + 1 retrap

Song Thrush  1

Whitethroat  1

Chiffchaff  1

Willow Warbler  1

Long-tailed Tit   1 + 1 retrap

Blue Tit  1 + 1 retrap

Bullfinch  1

Middleton Nature Reserve 

This nice shot by Janet

Common Blue Damselflies 

These nice mobile phone shots of the northern lights (aurora borealis) on Friday, taken by Garry Byrne, from within the recording area at 23:30.

Broad-bodied Chaser joins the four spots

A very light SE(ish) breeze shifted to NW for a few hours in the afternoon. Very warm again peaking at almost 24°C.

A walk along, the surprisingly quiet, south wall after lunch was very pleasant, but not very productive (Malcolm)

Dunlin 6 north

Linnet 3 between lighthouse and waterfall

Rock Pipit 2 - the male standing guard above the lighthouse nest chased off a rival.

He managed to catch a passing invertebrate

A striking male Pied Wagtail in summer plumage 

Grey seal 1 female drifting in with the tide. This sleep while you move technique is called bottling, for obvious reasons.

Quite a few insects around:

Small White 8

Small Tortoiseshell 1

Brimstone 1 male

Silver Y one on saltmarsh 

Middleton Nature Reserve 

Janet checked first

Only a rear view, but about as good a view as you ever get of a Cetti's warbler!

Common Whitethroat 

Broad-bodied Chaser - first of the year

I had a look mid afternoon (Malcolm). This is my shot of a Four-spotted Chaser for comparison.

Four-spotted Chaser

Lots of damselflies around again. This is a female Common Bluetail 

Butterflies:

Brimstone 1 male

Speckled Wood 3

Orange Tip 5 males 3 female

Large White 2 males

Small White/Green-veined White several

Small Tortoiseshell 1

Wildfowl as yesterday with the addition of...

Tufted Duck 3  - the female has only a feeble tuft, but she did her best to spruce it up (a Blackcap has a little sing towards the end of this clip).

Tufted Duck

Dragonflies emerging

A very light mainly NW breeze. Plenty of sunshine and very wam peaking at 23°C mid afternoon.

Heysham skear - low water 08:00 (Malcolm)

Shelduck 1 north

Eider 85 - these are a few of them still squabbling over partners.

Red-breasted Merganser 11 - these are five of them.

Great Crested Grebe 6

Little Egret 3

A pair of Lesser Black-Backed gulls resting on a honeycomb worm reef.

Not many waders around today, partly because the outer skear was also exposed and some would have been there. But there definitely was a reduction.

Oystercatcher 400 (although many more were seen flying from the outer skear as it was covered)

Knot 450

Curlew 1 (no Whimbrel today, it sounded strange as their calls have been a constant soundtrack on the skear during recent visits)

Dunlin just 1

I went as far as the middle skear goes this morning, all the pools out there are full of Hydroid colonies (see yesterday's post). I cant recall seeing this many before. They are quite delicate, perhaps it is just down to the recent calm conditions. This clip gives a better idea of their form, remember they are not a plant but made up of tiny individual animals.

Middleton Nature Reserve 

Janet checked in the morning before it really warmed up. Still there was insect activity 

Female Green-veined White

Male Common Blue Damselfly 

Four-Spotted Chaser - first of the year - seen by Janet but passed to quickly for a shot.

I checked in the very warm mid afternoon (Malcolm). I managed to locate two very fresh looking Four-Spotted Chasers.

Four-spotted Chaser

This is the other one

There were lots of teneral damselflies around but a few more mature ones as well.

Large Red 1

Common Blue 2 males 

Azure Blue 1 female

Female Azure Blue

Male Common Blue

Butterflies:

Orange Tip 6 male 2 female

Green-veined White 2

Brimstone male and female

Speckled Wood 1

Common Blue 1 male

Warblers, were less vocal than of late, but still plenty to be heard. These numbers reflect singing birds.

Cetti's warbler 5 

Chiffchaff 2

Willow warbler 3

Blackcap 1 

Reed warbler 3

Sedge warbler 2

Reed Bunting 2

Wildfowl:

The only Mute seen were the nesting pair. But Tim Butler pond not checked.

Coot 4

Moorhen 3

Little grebe at least 1, but very elusive on the main pond.

Gadwall 3 males

Mallard 7 (1 female). These two male seem to be guarding this female, but for no obvious reason. There were no chicks around (Reed Bunting and a Reed warbler (plus a Blackbird) singing in the background).

An odd day!

 A light west breeze. An overcast morning then a combination of sunshine and mist in the afternoon.

A couple of shots from Janet:

A Herring Gull collecting nest material at Half Moon Bay yesterday 

Another Silver Y on Middleton Nature Reserve today

I escorted a field trip around Heysham Head 10:30 - 12:00 (Malcolm)

Greylag goose 12 flew low to the south, east of the Head. 

Eider 4

Little Egret 2

Swallow 6 north

Rock Pipit at least 2 below the cliffs.

Linnet 3

Goldfinch 9

Chiffchaff 1 singing 

Blackcap 1 singing near the car park

Willow Warbler 1 seen

Common Whitethroat 3 - 2 singing males and a female

Lesser Whitethroat 1 singing

House Sparrow 30 plus in the two fields to the south of the head

Kestrel 1 female hunting

Jackdaw 5

Magpie 2

Carrion Crow 1

Wood Pigeon 6

Robin, Dunlin and Wrens singing.

Heysham skear (Malcolm)

I went out this evening on the ebbing tide. It was almost surreal. I was in bright sunshine the whole time, but a fog bank came in......

........first obscuring the harbour and Power Stations

Then the Head and Heysham village disappeared 

Then all of Morecambe was gone - the fog bank then continued north and reality slowly returned.

Eider 53

Red-breasted Merganser 4

Little Egret 5

A sunlit Little Egret with fog bound Morecambe for a backdrop 

Oystercatcher 1,000

Knot 350

Curlew 2

Curlew and Lesser Black-Backed gull

Whimbrel 7 at least

Whimbrel, with the now returning Heysham in the background 

Turnstone 11 in one flock 

No Godwit, Redshank, Dunlin or Sanderlings seen

These are doing very well this year

There are always some around, but every pool seems to have a population this year. I say population because although they look like a feathery plant they are in fact colonies of tiny animals. They are Hydroids (part of the Hydrozoa class). I believe this species is Whiteweed, but I would be happy to be corrected (Malcolm)

Buoy watch

A misty start with a light SW breeze drifting more towards the west during the day. Some hazy sunshine in the afternoon.

"Seawatch" Pete and Jean.

Report by Pete:

Visibility only just beyond buoys for an hour then twice that distance for the second hour of very intermittent seawatching.

A few bits on the sea in poor vis late stages of the tide : 

1 Razorbill

5 guillemot

1 Gannet

25, 7, 15 common scoter

7 sandwich tern

2 porpoise

10 swallow.   

South shore

It was still very misty when I went down the sea wall this morning (Malcolm), although visibility was starting to improve. 

There are a lot of young large gulls around at the moment. This is what No.1 outflow looked like, and this is a big improvement to when I set off.

Immature Herring and Lesser Black-Backed gulls resting on the sea wall

Bar-Tailed Godwit 54 feeding between the outflows.

You may have noticed an immature Herring Gull instinctively collecting nest material towards the end of the above clip. The mature birds were at it in earnest.

Lesser Black-Backed gull collecting nest material

This Herring Gull in the harbour is already sitting

Rock Pipit 2 - one near the waterfall was feeding itself. But this one by the lighthouse was taking food to the nest.

It will never go to its nest site when it knows it is being watched.
 It is waiting here on the sloping roundhead wall, its nest is in the harbour wall.

Linnet 2 between the lighthouse and waterfall.

This is what the two buoys out from the north wall looked like when I arrived.
The southern yellow buoy was faring better than the northern buoy 

But only a few minutes later the southern buoy is almost submerged
and a minute or so later it was completely under

Janet checked later in the tide.

Post readers often ask where Potts corner is. It is the car park at
Middleton sands, and these Eider are heading straight for it

These shots are also from Janet, taken at Middleton Nature Reserve yesterday.

Male Pheasant 

This shot isn't about the Whitethroat, but look at all the insects around the bush!

Heysham skear (Malcolm)

Just a very quick check,as the inner skear was becoming exposed.

Sandwich Tern 2

Eider 51

Great Crested Grebe 2

Little Egret 3

Grey Heron 1

Oystercatcher initially c300 but they were arriving all the time at least 800 before I left

Whimbrel 7

Knot none at first then c800 arrived

Turnstone 1

Dunlin 31

Dunlin

This moth was trapped in Kevin Eaves' garden. But not in Kevin's trap! Alison Hayward is now running a separate moth trap in Kevin's garden.

She had this rather stunning Orange Footman last night. 

Orange Footman - It has a southerly distribution in the UK and is not at all
common this far North. A first for Alison..... and me! (Kevin)

While we are talking orange, this clip, also from Kevin close to his home to the east of the recording area.

This railway line marks the eastern boundary of the recording area.
Fortunately not a very busy line!