Pelagic visitors

Not much happening on the seabird front- the usual smattering of Cory's shearwaters, two great shearwaters in 2 days and a probable Royal tern did a fairly distant fly past. We have had a couple of rays (probably mantas) and a turtle swim past as well, so at least I have had a few photo. opportunities. Three days to go then I am heading back to the NW highlands of Scotland to get up to speed with some terrestrial birding.



'Fred'

We had a flock of 9 cattle egrets (I think) over the sea- 8 kept going (west!) but one peeled off, headed for the ship and then decided to take a rest on the radar mast. I prefer to see terrestrial bird species just keep going, as the longer they stay onboard the more weight they lose and the more dehydrated they become. Inevitably many die or  leave the ship looking much weaker than when they arrived-contrary to my frequent efforts to tempt many birds with fresh water. Anyway, one of the ships' officers (Gemma) decided that as this individual stayed over night 'he' should be named and so he was called 'Fred'! Who am I to argue....anyway, the following morning after a couple of false attempts 'Fred' finally decided to leave his roost and headed off over the sea- I suppose he just liked travelling solo!

 

 

 

Surf's up!

Quite a nice encounter with a pod of pilot whales recently. These benign whales often appear inquisitive and readily approach vessels, especially when they hear noise generated by winches and survey gear! At times they can be a bit of a menace as they do sometimes get in the way of survey work. Fortunately this encounter occurred during a near- four hour line turn so there was no conflict of interest and they were free to enjoy their surf time without any concerns! It was also good to get a relatively close pass from another Wilson's storm-petrel and also good to see a Cory's shearwater living up to its' name and shearing through the water with its' wingtip!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Brilliant Bulwer's!

Some avian encounters are typified by beautiful plumage or melodious song, but others- particularly concerning seabirds- are often imprinted in my brain by the sheer exuberence of their flight action as they move over the restless ocean. I was enjoying watching the Cory's and Wilson's a couple of days ago when a dark, long-winged, long-tailed petrel passed over the swell into my line of sight. It was a brief image- just a flashing blade really- a dark, dashing petrel scything it's way over the ocean, occasionally stalling and picking at the surface and once I saw it briefly (and distantly) sat on the ocean- I knew it was something special and after a slightly closer view I realised that I was onto a Bulwer's petrel! Again, my distant photographs are not prize winners but it was a fantastic encounter non the less.

 

I'm really pleased with my copy of the 'multimedia identification guide to North Atlantic seabirds- Storm-petrels & Bulwer's Petrel by Bob Flood & Ashley Fisher- this has really helped me in identifying some tricky species over the last year and I would recommend it to anyone with an interest in seabirds. (I have already pre-ordered the next volume concerning pterodromas- can't wait!)

 

 

wonderful Wilson's

Had a fairly uneventful passage down from Las Palmas, with very few birds seen- just a handful of distant Cory's, a single tern sp. and what looked like a very distant immature gannet. Had a couple of Wilson's storm- petrels following the ship this afternoon though, which really brightened my mood. They hung around and put on a show for about 5 minutes before drifting off over the waves and out of view. I rattled off a few record shots before realising that I had completely forgotten how difficult it is to get shots of storm petrels with their unpredictable dancing flight- quickly changing angles and depth of field- no matter really as it is just great to see these lovely birds.

Birdtrack ramble

Spring came and went, the migrants were thin on the ground and I found nothing in the NW to quicken the pulse, with 'local' star attractions limited to wood warbler, ring ouzel and osprey. Now tis 'summer', birds are becoming less vocal and are busy nesting or raising their broods. With a near 300 mile drive to twitch a blue-winged teal the only sort of twitch temptation, I decided to spend some time on a local patch and submit another bird track list. Highlights- well none really unless you count a greenshank, 2 twite and a couple of singing sedge warblers but I had four hours along the coast to the north of Ullapool and managed to record 37 species. I also got a few snaps and enjoyed some lovely scenery and dry, cool weather. All good stuff but worryingly I have yet to record a whitethroat NW of Inverness!

linnet

twite

Ardmair bay from the NNE

greenfinch

rock pipit

mallard & ducklings

The curse of the corncrake

I first heard a distant corncrake in the late 1970's- a single bird calling from a cereal crop field in Dorset on a lovely late spring evening. Naturally the field was vast and there was no way I was ever going to see the bird but it was a lovely experience. Fast forward 30 years or so and I found myself in the outer Hebrides for the first time in June 2000 for a fly fishing holiday on the island of South Uist. I caught a few trout, enjoyed a few drams and heard a lot of corncrakes- they were everywhere it seemed, with birds calling from every strip of grass, every patch of nettles and every drainage channel full of flag irises. After dinner, most evenings I would pick up my binoculars and try and stalk a bird in the hope of seeing one. When a bird called I took a few very slow, quiet steps along the adjacent tracks towards it, waited patiently when it stopped it's monotonous 'crex crex'  call, then repeated the process- over and over and over again! Often I felt as if I was tantalisingly close to the bird, only for it to evaporate through the vegetation and then start calling much further away. The task was exasperated by the way in which the bird would be able to 'throw' it's voice, often aided by swirling air currents- sometimes giving the impression that the bird was much closer than it probably was. Initially this was just a bit of birding fun- but I needed to see a corncrake before I could add it to my 'life list'. Anyway, the holiday ended and I still needed to tick off a corncrake. Since 2000 I have visited South Uist on 6 or 7 occasions and have also visited North Uist, Benbecula and had several extended visits to Lewis- all these islands holding good numbers of corncrakes in the summer months. I have spent countless hours over the last decade or so on each of these visits trying to see this wretched bird with the 'fun' going out of the encounters many moons ago. Recently I returned to Lewis to spend a few days birding at Eorpie, port of Nis and the Butt of Lewis. On the first evening I heard a corncrake calling from the edge of loch Stiapabhat. I enjoyed views of garganey, gadwall and a black-tailed godwit and tried to ignore the rather annoying 'crex crex' call. The following day as well as enjoying some decent weather and good birding, a couple more corncrakes were heard- but I had given up trying to see one. A day later I stopped to try and get some phone signal near the tea room when yet another corncrake started calling from a patch of rough vegetation. I checked my sms rare bird alerts, casually strolled towards the vegetation and to my disbelief a corncrake lifted its' head above the leaves and launched itself into the air- it flew quite high past one of the crofts giving good flight views and leaving me once again totally bemused at the ups and downs of birding. Later I had the added bonus of a glaucous gull and a fantastic experience when an adult long-tailed skua settled on the rough pasture just west of the lighthouse- happy birding days indeed!

Patch rewards

I love the excitement and exhilaration of twitching a new bird, but obviously with temporal and financial constraints it is just not feasible to do this as much as I would like. Having said that, I get a massive amount of satisfaction from finding 'good' birds on my local patches. This is especially so during 'spring' and 'autumn' migration times as you never know what will turn up. I readily admit that my record of finding rare and scarce birds is rather poor but aside from that, finding 'year ticks' is the bread and butter of much of my birding.  Recently and contrary to a very late highland spring, a trickle of migrants have been pushing through and aside from the regular willow warblers, sand martins and wheatears I have enjoyed a flurry of white wagtails (alba), a single osprey and a handful of whimbrel- birding at its' very rewarding best!

osprey- pretty uncommon in the extreme NW

wheatear

whimbrel