26th-28th May
Its been a three day period involving lots of fog and plenty of birds, its also been highly frustrating a couple of small falcons seen badly and a Large Pipit that was probably a Tawny gave us the runaround, it was only seen by two people and never see well enough to totally clinch it.
The 26th started with a Marsh Warbler trapped at Holland House and continued in much the same vein as the previous day as the Blue-headed Wagtail was still around Lurand while plenty of commoner migrants still hung around. A group of three Wood Sandpipers went over the airfield and a second Yellow Wagtail of the day was around Brides. Red-backed Shrikes were once again the order of the day with 14 seen throughout the day, Icterine Warbler numbers were left at six but there may have been more. The day was perhaps overshadowed by the aforementioned Large Pipit as it was seen vanishing over Breck and despite an extensive search it couldn't be refound.
The following day saw haar drift in and out all day eventually leading to the cancellation of all afternoon flights onto the island. A flava Wagtail was the first bird of the day to give us a proper run around as it was heard giving interesting calls, it soon started to get more rangey and eventually we decided to go birding! Censuses were plagued with poor visibility, however the first Canada Goose of the year was seen in the mist and eventually census ground to halt with the brief re-sighting of our mystery Pipit, it was seen at Tor Ness before it was flushed by an Arctic Skua, a three hour search ensued only producing a Barnacle Goose and lots of very tired legs! Overall we finished the day a little dejected and wondering how we'd failed to re-find the bird.
A foggy start on the 28th gave way to a warm and sunny afternoon, two Nightjars were around Holland with a male roosting on a wall by the road for most of the day. Good numbers of Red-backed Shrikes still remained as did seven of the Icterine Warblers with three in Holland, two at the surgery, one at Lurand and one at Ancum. A Curlew Sandpiper was at Brides and the previous days Canada Goose was near Hooking, a female Redstart was near Upper Linnay and the flava Wagtail was now also at Hooking.
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