Last minute Little Gull

The wind started WSW but moved more to SSW by lunchtime. Mainly overcast with a few light showers and the odd sunny spell.

Heysham skear - low water 10:00 (MD)

Pale-bellied Brent goose 27 (of c45) - Once again they were scattered on and around the skear in small groups, feeding on the broken weed left by the storms. 27 was all that I located, but at 13:40 c45 flew from the north side to Red Nab.

This is typical of the patches of broken weed and grasses etc, left all around the skear. In this patch there are several pieces of sea lettuce, which I know the Brent like, but they probably eat much of the other green stuff as well.

Patches of broken weed like this are strewn around the skear edges.

Eider 171 (counted by Pete from Knowlys, I'd estimated 160+, which is close for me!)

Someone asked me the other day, what the black ducks with a white throat are. The answer was a  2nd calendar year male Eider. This one was just sorting out its feathers (clip actually from yesterday).

No Knot today, but there seemed more than usual Turnstone (80+)

South shore

Once again, excellent and very thorough coverage all day provided by at least 8 observers. Unfortunately, for most of the day there was little to see.

Female Eider in the Harbour seemed to top the bill! But I managed a final check in the fading light an hour after high water and was fortunate enough to be rewarded with:

Little gull 1 adult feeding along the sea wall just west of No.2 outflow. Located at 16:50 and still feeding on my return from the harbour at 17:25.

Today's adult Little Gull

The Pale-bellied Brent geese were already feeding on Red Nab. Perhaps they didn't leave at high water. This clip shows how close they were to the sea wall an hour after high water.

Shag 1 2nd calendar year feeding on the waterfall - sightings of Shag are becoming more erratic, the days are getting longer and, at the right times, fishing at the waterfall is easy, so presumably it quickly finds enough to eat before resting in the many secluded areas around the inner harbour

This Curlew was having a bad "hair" day!

Cold strong winds tomorrow, wrap up well!