The sea still providing the main interest

A sunny morning becoming overcast with the odd shower in the afternoon. Light variable breeze.

Seawatch report - Pete 0730 on:

Arctic Tern: 18,55,48,16,2,65 (204) in, all before 0800 and before the sandbanks covered

Black Tern: 2 with first Arctic Tern flock

Arctic Skua: 1 dark morph in 1000

6 Gannet

c66 in four lots Kittiwake

c271 Common Scoter

2 Red-Throated Diver

c45 Sandwich tern

Guillemot 2

Razorbill one floating in

Little gull 2cy feeding on inbound outfalls gunge

Painted Lady and a Large White along back of Harbour road

Middleton Nature Reserve

Ringing report by Alan:

I set nets this morning at Middleton, the conditions were good but I found it quite cool to start with and had plenty of clothing layers, many of which were peeled off as the morning progressed.
A decent selection of species were caught and, unusually,  I was accompanied by Louise, a visiting ringer today. We caught a respectable 26 birds including two retrapped Common Whitethroats and one retrapped Lesser Whitethroat that were returning individuals ringed here in 2025.
 
The catch comprised in total:
Sedge Warbler  4 + 1 retrap
Whitethroat  2 retraps
Lesser Whitethroat  2 + 1 retrap
Cetti's Warbler  1 retrap
Great Tit  1 retrap
Lesser Redpoll  4
Robin  1
Reed Bunting  1
Willow Warbler  3
Chiffchaff  1
Song Thrush  1
Wren  1
Blackbird  2 retraps (breeding pair)

Rosemary and Peter Silvester checked out the main pond yesterday:

Large Red Damselfly 

I think the Mayfly just came to visit me for a salt lick!

Also seen but too flighty to photograph:

Brimstone - 1

Red Admiral - 1

Speckled Wood - 4

Green Veined White - 2

Male Orange Tip - 6

Heysham skear - Malcolm

I checked twice 08:15 - 10:00. I started again 14:45 which coincided with the only significant shower of the day so an early bath at 15:15.

All records this morning unless stated

Eider 10

Red-breasted Merganser 9

Great Crested grebe 5

Little Egret 4

Sandwich Tern 18 (13 feeding plus 3 and 2 in) just 2 seen this afternoon 

Sandwich Tern just resurfacing with a small Whitebait. Plus Mergansers

Great Crested Grebe

Little Gull 1 2nd calendar year in. This is additional to the outfall bird

2cy Little Gull, much clearer first winter markings than the outfall bird.
It possibly ended up at Leighton Moss, as one with similar plumage 
arrived there this afternoon 

Whimbrel 5 this morning 10 this afternoon 

Knot c2000 this morning was a bit of a surprise, one new flagged bird for this period was seen. Only 130 this afternoon.

Knot on the skear

Later moved to the mud by the incoming tide

Turnstone 43 (33 and 10)

33 Turnstones in this shot

Ringed Plover 11 this afternoon 

Just out of the recording area, Heysham Moss Nature Reserve - Janet in this morning's sunshine 

Grasshopper Warbler 1 reeling

Sedge Warbler

Four-Spotted Chaser

Large Red Damselfly

Green Veined White - Silver Y moth also seen