Monday 19th December

Back to normal tonight, doing the blog at a more sensible hour of the day.... Mike from Bird Quest had left a message on the phone last night with highlights of their 3 day stay over here, 9 Slavonian Grebes in Loch Indaal off Gortain, a Canada Goose Hutchinsii sp was up the back of Bridgend on Sunday, and also another Canada, Taverner's sp up at Cennacroic on the way to Mulindry. At the head of Loch Indaal, there was a group of 19 Pale bellied Brent with another 8 also seen. A pair of White tailed Sea Eagles were seen over at Killinallan, male Hen Harriers were seen at Loch Gorm, Bunnahabhain and another one at Cennacroic. A ringtail was seen South of Port Charlotte while a Short eared Owl was seen on a fence post in the dark as they were coming up from Portnahaven. A Peregrine was at Gruinart and 4 Greenshank were out the front of the hide. Over at Bunnahabhain, 2 Guillemots and 9 Black Guillemots were seen as well as an Otter! A Tree Sparrow was at Blackrock while along at Loch Gorm, a pair of Chough, a flock of Reed Buntings and 3 Yellowhammers were seen. Today off the ferry as they headed back to Kennacraig their tally read as follows, 60 Kittiwakes,10 Razorbills, 20 Great Northern Divers, half of which were flying West. A Puffin was at the mouth of West Loch Tarbert, while in West Loch Tarbert, 7 Black throated Divers, 10 Red throated Divers. Many thanks for sightings folks. Today on Bob had a small Merlin at home, just the size of a Mistle Thrush . Later on there were several Snipe and Woodcock coming in to feed on the barley stubbles with around 300 Whitefronts coming in to roost. Mary had seen a Water Rail crossing the road at Easter Ellister as she came to work this morning. The figures came through from the team at SNH for the December International Goose count which was carried out last week, the scores on the doors were as follows, 42,595 Barnies and 4,670 Whitefronts. Many thanks for these stats.