Winds went round to a more southerly direction today, but still quite cold. A calm dryish start turned into a slightly more breezy at times afternoon with occasional rain.
The Nature Scotland group kicked things off with a look over Loch Indaal from Blackrock this morning when the seas were nice and calm making counts easier. They had the first good count of Slavonian Grebes this winter with a total of 26 birds, plus 12 Long-tailed Ducks, 38 Red-throated Divers, 46 Red-breasted Mergansers, 11 Brent Geese and a whopping 200 Common Scoter. In contrast there was just on lonely Scaup and a couple of Great Northern Divers. They also had 2 Otters a Peregrine and 8 Twite.
Mary Redman was down t Kilchoman and counted 29 Ringed Plovers on the sandy dune fields adjacent to Machir Bay, while up at Gruinart Clive Mc. counted 11 Little Egrets - the highest count for the species on Islay so far I believe (the previous highest being 10 last November).
Nature Scotland ventured down to The Oa later in the day scoring 2 Merlins, 2 adult and a juv Golden Eagle and 12 Twite. Looking on the Big Strand down at Kintra they found 19 Re-throated Divers and another Slav. Grebe. Not hanging about, they later found a Kingfisher on the River Sorn at Bridgend before finishing at Gruinart where a Golden Eagle was hunting Barnies.
No comments:
Post a Comment