Fairly typical summer birding at the moment with things being generally quiet. I briefly considered a big drive south to try and get onto the Bridled tern, but with the bird being rather mobile I really couldn't justify a gamble on that much fuel- ditto the Argyl Ascension frigatebird! After my month at sea I felt the need to enjoy the good weather and stretch my legs, so I spent a few hours on the coast path between Stoer lighthouse and Stoer head. This stretch of coastline is famous for the sea stack known as the 'old man of Stoer', the area occasionally attracts a good migrant or two and can also be good for spotting basking sharks and a number of marine mammal species. There were good numbers of tourists on the coast paths and few birds about, although I did enjoy looking down on the seabird colonies. A few pairs of bonxies patrolled the headlands, there were good numbers of recently fledged wheatears and a colour-ringed twite was probably bird of the day. I also saw 3 summer plumaged dunlin come in off the sea from the NW- I wonder if that signals the start of 'autumnal' wader passage?
 |
| old man of Stoer |
 |
| great skua |
 |
| guillemots |
 |
| razorbills |
 |
| skylark |
 |
| twite with coloured leg rings |
No comments:
Post a Comment