An early afternoon sweep of the Estuary showed 39 Blackwits (well 37, with two more opposite Axmouth FC) and amongst the Gulls were this nice adult Med...
We only have one or two Meds around at the moment - the other day Brett counted 285 on his patch on The Fleet!
There was also this (very exciting!) thing. At first the mantle shade along with the amount of white on the birds primaries made this look good for my first argentatus Herring Gull of the winter, but it lacked the size and there's a few other things not quite right with it. So I've put it down as just a darker than average argenteus...
It was quite striking in the field, the light conditions were ideal for 'gulling'
There's still loads of birds opposite Axmouth FC. Three Shoveler (one drake) were a 'field tick' for me.
A little later, from Seaton Hole, two Great Crested Grebes and a Common Scoter were all I could spy on the sea.
Am liking the forecast with cold weather predicted, things might get interesting by the end of the week....I hope!
Finally, there was another new addition to my 'birding library' today, this....
It is huge!
It is literally a library in itself, being 746 pages long! But it is an invaluable addition to my collection, and surprisingly up to date too. For example, the Solitary Sandpiper is in there under 'Pending records new to Devon', along with Yelkouan Shearwater, Barolo's Shearwater (Lundy this year), Elegant Tern, etc. Bearing in mind the Sandpiper was only just over a month ago, it is incredibly up to date for a book of this calibre. Well done Mr T I say!
We only have one or two Meds around at the moment - the other day Brett counted 285 on his patch on The Fleet!There was also this (very exciting!) thing. At first the mantle shade along with the amount of white on the birds primaries made this look good for my first argentatus Herring Gull of the winter, but it lacked the size and there's a few other things not quite right with it. So I've put it down as just a darker than average argenteus...
It was quite striking in the field, the light conditions were ideal for 'gulling'There's still loads of birds opposite Axmouth FC. Three Shoveler (one drake) were a 'field tick' for me.
A little later, from Seaton Hole, two Great Crested Grebes and a Common Scoter were all I could spy on the sea.
Am liking the forecast with cold weather predicted, things might get interesting by the end of the week....I hope!
Finally, there was another new addition to my 'birding library' today, this....
It is huge!It is literally a library in itself, being 746 pages long! But it is an invaluable addition to my collection, and surprisingly up to date too. For example, the Solitary Sandpiper is in there under 'Pending records new to Devon', along with Yelkouan Shearwater, Barolo's Shearwater (Lundy this year), Elegant Tern, etc. Bearing in mind the Sandpiper was only just over a month ago, it is incredibly up to date for a book of this calibre. Well done Mr T I say!
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