Scraping the barrel.

Today was blowing a strong Easterly 6 with some drizzle. A month ago and I would have taken time off work to sift through the migrants, but not at the end of November.

I popped to Boulmer for 20 mins before work today for a seawatch ( give it up for god's sake, its finished...) and had 6 Little Auks, 2 Wigeon a few Gannets and Kittiwakes and thats the lot. Seawatching this late is usually for some Little Auks for the patch list but we've had plenty of those now so there is not much left to hope for. Possibly a late Sooty or Stormy or maybe a Blue Fulmar would be nice. I had a couple of very dark ones last year at this time.

Lots of gulls were around presumably to gorge on the storm battered pipefish again. It could be worth checking through them at the weekend. Several hundred Starlings were on the rocks and small parties were flying along the shore. I wonder if they are new in?

Speaking of Little Auks I got a call last night from John Steele who lives in Rothbury. He had found a Little Auk there on an industrial estate and was trying to give it a rest in an old fish tank ( handy things, fish tanks) before releasing it back on the coast this morning. To prevent the same gull gobbling disasters that have been photographed lately, I suggested that he release his bird while still dark so it could make its escape out to sea under cover. Rothbury is about 12 miles inland as the Auk flies so this is quite a notable record, especially as this is his second there. The first, a few years back, walked into his garage while he was working on his car one dark night!