Saturday 26th February

As a change from cold northerly gales with rain, and sleet, today was slightly milder with strong southerly winds and dry.

Chris Mills with his Norfolk Birding group arrived today seeing some good birds on the ferry journey: 35 Great Northern Diver, 5 Slavonian Grebe, 2 Red-throated Diver, Greenshank (Kennacraig harbour), 5 Razorbill, 10 Guillemot & 12 Black Guillemot.- mostly on the mainland side of the crossing. Closer to arriving there was a 2cy Glaucous Gull in the Sound of Jura opposite Port Askaig and 3 White-tailed Eagles over Jura on way in.

Once on Islay the group found 2x 3cy Iceland Gulls at Blackrock (Ashley Saunders had seen a 2cy bird there earlier, supporting the idea that at least 3 are present); 15 Twite & 30 Skylarks and 2 Chough were in stubble near Coull Farm. At Gruinart there were 15 Whoopers.and the dramatic sight of a White-tailed Eagle feeding on goose remains which then caught, killed and plucked another Barnacle Goose – yum-yum. At Loch Skerrols they located 2 of the Lesser Scaup - the adult drake and the adult female (Ashley Saunders had seen all 3 there earlier). In fields to the north of Skerrols were good counts of 40 Lesser Redpoll & c100 Fieldfares.

Our Islay Birding Whatsapp was working well today, as Ashley Saunders with his Oriole Birding group found a Cackling Goose at Wester Ellister and immediately put it on the App allowing Chris (and myself) to pop down and catch up with it shortly afterwards. Also down at Ellister were 2 more White-tailed Eagles and yet another at Carrabus.

Other visiting birders had been making the most of a dry day:

Will Scott checked Kilnaughton Bay again in case of rare divers, but found none. But on Loch Indaal from Bowmore he recorded 16 Eider, 35 Common Scoter, 5 Long-tailed Duck, 6 Goldeneye, 10 Red-breasted Merganser, 12 Slavonian Grebe, 3 Black Guillemot, 15 Great Northern and 1 Red-throated Diver and the first Lesser Black-backed Gull of the “spring” – even though it is still only late February.

Kathy Evans had 50 or more Fieldfares and a few Redwing at Finlaggan and a Golden Eagle near Bunnahabhain.

To round off the day, Ashley sent in a detailed description and record shots of three very odd-looking, possible/probable hybrid Barnacle x Canada/Cackling Geese.at Leorin in the evening. Hopefully they will be seen again tomorrow, more photos taken and perhaps a conclusion made as to what they are. (Colin Bushell confirms that he saw either these birds or something similar when he was here last month - and Malcolm Ogilvie confirms that Barnacle x Canada hybrids have been recorded here in the past, sometimes helpfully with the parent birds making identification easier!)