Scoring at Skaw!

More of today (and yesterday's) birding in another post, but the finding of a Red-throated Pipit late this morning merits its own post! Having done the cliffs north of Skaw we were kicking around the croft when Paul came on the radio to say that he'd had a bunting drop into the front, where he was having a coffee (and didn't even have his bins on!). Mindful that Dave Cooper and his dad had seen a Reed Bunting here earlier, I assumed that this was what it was going to be, so continued working round in Paul's direction. Paul then came on the radio again to say that the bird was in fact a pipit...

Approaching the bird from different directions, we had views of it on the ground, but I was none the wiser as it was obscured in the grass and against the light. But then it called... I was straight on the radio - "It just gave a pseee call", knowing full well what that suggested, and Paul knew too - "that would make it a Red-throat!". It then flicked up and flew down onto the beach, calling again. We both hurdled the wire fence between us and it, and binned it. I think I almost shouted "Its got pale braces!", and Paul shouted something similar... it then flew a short distance again onto the opposite side of the stream, where the light was a bit better.

We were both rattling shots off, and it then flew again, perching up for a few moments before dropping out of sight. A quick review of our shots allowed us to check a few key features - yellowish base to the bill; dense spotting across the breast; buffish stripes down the mantle; and no visible primary projection. We hadn't seen the rump, but had seen enough - it was definitely a Red-throated Pipit. 

Red-throated Pipit

Red-throated Pipit

Red-throated Pipit

Red-throated Pipit

We then decided to refind the bird, but in doing so I managed to flush it, and this time it headed several hundred metres up the valley and appeared to drop into some long grass. Rather than flushing it again, we had our lunch and wait for other people to arrive. After 20 minutes or so a tour group in two minibuses pulled up, so we headed off to look for the bird. However, we'd hardly gone 50 yards when a pipit flew up from near where we'd seen it originally, and flew towards the beach; after a quick search we located it - the Red-throat again, much to everyone's delight!