4th-6th August
Quite a busy few days bird wise with a large number of waders passing through the island on the 4th and 5th. We'll jump straight in with that and the highest totals of the commoner waders over the past three days.
281 Oystercatcher, 140 Ringed Plover, 1222 Golden Plover, 172 Lapwing, 306 Sanderling, 167 Dunlin, 42 Bar-tailed Godwits, 132 Curlew, 89 Redshank and 679 Turnstone all made for impressive totals, especially the Sanderling as 279 of the 306 were on one small beach near Hooking! Otherwise it's been much of the same with a few new bits thrown in. The Short-eared Owl first seen on the 3rd has been seen everyday in slightly different locations. The juvenile Goldeneye remained faithful to Brides Loch. Presumably the same juvenile Ruff was near Holm on the 5th and a juvenile Kestrel went South over Peckhole on the same date.
A lone Crossbill was around the obs on the morning of the 5th followed by 3 birds on the 6th. Up to 2 Hen Harriers have been patrolling the newly cut fields between Holland and Bridesness while the same number of Sparrowhawks have been no doubt terrorising Linnets around Holland. A Common Sandpiper at Sand Geo was the first of the Autumn as was an early Garden Warbler at Brigg on the 6th. Finally the Tern numbers have really built up over the last three days with a count of 2283 on the 4th only being surpassed the next day by 2827 birds, including a flock of 1300 around Bewan that contained adult and juvenile Common Terns.
With a period of light Easterlies on the horizon we're hoping for a speedy start to Autumnal migration having been given good early signs!
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| Sanderlings GG |
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