Stewchat...

Top - Look closer, there is a Glaucous Gull in the middle of the shot. How lucky was that, I didn't even see it in there !

Bottom - I tried to get as many gulls into one frame as possible...

Click on pictures for a bigger image.

This morning I thought I would spend a couple of hours in Linton Hide gull watching. On arrival, about four cars were parked in the tiny space. Was there a twitch on? No. The occupants of the vehicles were renovating the hide! Typical.

I decided to check the nearby refuse tip. There were thousands of gulls here and I soon found a juv Glaucous sitting on the banks, but every attempt to get a picture was thwarted when it flew into the surrounding melee of feeding birds. Tim Dean rang to say that the 'Nordic' Jackdaw was at Bothal again so off I went. As I got into the car a second call from Tim was to tell me that it had flown off. But this was just the start of my bad luck for the day...
A further half hour at Bothal had 5 Pink footed Geese and 2 Barnacle Geese with the usual commoner wildfowl. A party of 11 Pied Wagtails and 5 Meadow Pipits on the bankside may have been migrants.





This afternoon I took Bunty on a trek up into the hills. There was no gold to be found in them thar hills today thats for sure. We had 2 Stonechat, 2 Meadow Pipit, 1 Skylark, 1 Kestrel, 2 Red Grouse, 2 Curlew, 2 Lapwings and several crows. On the way down the hill Trevor Blake rang to tell me that there were two Cranes in a field only about half a mile from the tip I was at earlier!

I hope they linger until tomorrow so I can get them on my way to work.