Sunday 25th October

For once an earlier entry, or perchance did I not change the clock back??? This morning when I looked out into the garden there were some Redwings around a dozen or so, but I have certainly been outdone as the Rochdale birders had seen a massive fall of Redwings down on the Rhinns, from Port Wemyss, to Portnahaven and round to Claddach and they reckoned that there were several thousand seen all around, Dave had several flocks of 50 Redwings or so seen passing the Oa with around 70 Whoopers. The Rochdale birders had travelled on through the Rhinns, up and around both sides of Loch Gruinart and had a total of 328 seen on their travels, but none on Loch Indaal at all! We had around 160 at Coull alone with a further 30 or so on the water resting up on Loch Gorm. The Rochdale birders had seen 10 Stonechats, 9 being males on their travels, a male Merlin chasing a Meadow Pipit at Sunderland but no joy and then a female Merlin just further along the road. Over up towards Ardnave, 2 different female Sparrowhawks were spotted and then over at Bun an Uillt, 3 Greenshank were present. Finally down at Blackrock, a Kestrel was seen, a not bad day for day 1 of their visit!