An increasingly wild day with a southeasterly freshening into a full-blown gale and accompanied by heavy rain from mid-afternoon. Early doors, it was possible to get amongst a steady flow of overhead passage, including 245
Meadow Pipits, 200
Swallows and singles of
Little and
Cattle Egret through at the Bill, along with a thin scatter of grounded
Chiffchaffs and the like but soon seawatching was the only possibility. Watches at the Bill provided variety but not too much in the way of numbers save for 1000
auks and 220
Kittiwakes; 46
Balearic Shearwaters, 18
Common Scoter, 10
Arctic Skuas, 4
Knot, 2
Sooty Shearwaters and singles of
Great Northern Diver,
Manx Shearwater,
Great Skua and
Arctic Tern provided the best of the variety. A windswept Ferrybridge provided nothing beyond 52
Brent Geese, 30
Turnstones, 6
Bar-tailed Godwits and 2
Sanderling.
Red sky in the morning...very appropriate in view of what followed later © Mike Trew:
Some of the Bar-tailed Godwits getting buffeted about at Ferrybridge ©
Pete Saunders:
Strong SE winds increasing after dawn with stronger gusts before rain in the afternoon @portlandbirdobs.bsky.social heavily restricted ringing to one or sheltered nets for a spell wth only 3 new Chiffchaffs.seawatching being the best option. 673 birds of 23 species ringed since last Monday.
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— Peter J Morgan (@pbo61.bsky.social) September 29, 2024 at 6:33 PM
