Leach's passes by

Sowers all day, but most short lived. Sunny spells also short lived. A strong west wind.

Pete checked the sea from the back of the harbour 

Juvenile skua wheeling into bay 1304hrs. either Arctic or dark Long tailed - didn’t see it for long enough to be sure 

Leach's Petrel 1342hrs past the harbour entrance

Shag 1 juvenile 

A quick scan from Knowlsy Rd saw only a juvenile Sandwich Tern

South shore - Malcolm 13:00 - 16:00

Chiffchaff 1 calling in the Nature Park 

A walk along the sea wall and back plus a spell checking from the lighthouse saw nothing on the sea.

Rock Pipit 1 along the foreshore 

Wheatear 1 on the saltmarsh 

Linnet c60 on the saltmarsh, 

they were eating Samphire seeds

Lapwing 2 on the saltmarsh 

There were no waders along the waterline today, mainly as there was no waterline (I'll explain later). But there was a large group resting high up the shore just to the south of the recording area. I walked out to see what they were. Best estimates are

Knot 1750

Dunlin 250

Bar-Tailed Godwit 30

Grey Plover 80

It was approaching high water, but it was only 8.2m and the waterline 
should have been 50m away from here. But the shore is so flat here the
strong onshore wind blew a thin sheet of water over the whole beach

Fortunately something spooked them and they all flew north well within the recording area. The weather at this point was switching, literally minute by minute. One minute I was hunkered down against the rain with my camera stashed, the next minute I was in bright sunshine!

Not another rainbow shot! But this time with Bar-Tailed Godwits

Grey Plover and Knot

Also Grey Plover and Knot

Bar-Tailed Godwit and Knot

Knot, Grey Plover and Dunlin. This shot shows the water covering the
mud. It made it difficult checking for any colour marked birds

This was as close as I got. This Knot was ringed as part of a UK scheme.
It would have had a coded orange flag above the green ring. Both the rings
and flags are made of a very light thin plastic. They are designed to outlast
the average age of the species, but often don't outlast the longer lived individuals

Then the waders decided to head further south again.

It was nice seeing large flocks of waders again, but the approaching dark
clouds didn't have any gaps in them, so I headed off.

Earlier Kevin had seen c100 Shelduck out from Red Nab.
This was the only one I saw all afternoon!