Tuesday 8th February

I've resolved not to talk about the weather - as it's February you can just assume it's pretty bleak unless I say otherwise. Fortunately there's some keen visitors over...

Colin was at Loch Skerrols, seeing the 3 lesser scaup, a merlin and an apparent tufted x ring-necked duck hybrid. He describes it as "like a male tufted but with grey flank sides and white vertical mark at front of flank patch (though not as obvious as RND)". At Coullabus, he had a brief view of a cackling goose before losing it in a flock of barnies. A little egret at the head of Loch Indaal and a 3rd year golden eagle at Lagavulin were the highlights of the rest of what he calls a hard day. 

Sean and Steve had a smart male long-tailed duck on Loch Indaal and a couple of WTE, 1 over Gartnatra and 1 over Eresaid.

Our very own Mary had 4 fulmar over MacKenzie Island this morning.

Some details through from Tony Fox (from Aarhus University in Denmark, who co-ordinates Greenland white-front goose ring resightings) about the two collared birds that were at Carnduncan yesterday. Orange V3C is the more interesting, having been caught and ringed at Loch Ken in Galloway in winter 2008/09. It was present there again in winter 2009/10, and then made the jump to Islay, where it has been seen every year since 2010/11. Greenland white-fronts generally have pretty strict fidelity to their wintering sites, so it is unusual to see a bird change like this - presumably a result of pairing up with a bird that winters on Islay. V3C was seen in South Iceland in autumn 2010 and 2016, presumably whilst on the way to Islay. This bird has now been recorded 4 times in the same location at Carnduncan since December 2021.