Unst 2017: Days 3-5

Our second full day on Unst, the 26th, saw a quite start with little at Houlland (1 Chiffchaff), but a bit more around Baliasta, including a Yellow Wag over (Western judging from the call), a Brambling, and a Yellow-brow nearby at the Manse. On to Haroldswick, and as well as a mini influx of Grey Herons (7 plus 4), a single Robin was one of only a few migrants. 

Moving on to Clibberswick, we literally saw nothing, so paid a visit to Skaw, where a male Blackcap was the only migrant around the buildings. With the wind now quite strong from the south-east, we decided a good strategy might be to check the more sheltered cliffs and geos on the northern side of Lamba Ness. This can be exciting birding, and proved to be a reasonable decision, with 1 Redstart, 2 Robins, 1 Wheatear, 1 Mealy Redpoll, and 1 Song Thrush, plus 9 Dunlin and 2 Ruff, and a Whinchat back up towards the Skaw road.

Paul scanning the cliffs

Mealy Redpoll

Whinchat

Taking heart from these modest returns, we employed the same strategy at Skaw, which produced 1 Robin, 2 Goldcrests, 2 Song Thrush, 2 Wheatear, 1 Chiffchaff, and best a Little Bunting. A juv Glaucous Gull was with a handful of other gulls offshore, as was a small pod of Risso's Dolphins, a cetacean tick for me. We then had another look around the buildings, which still held the Blackcap, plus a Chiffchaff (with a couple of people on Twitter suggesting looked like an abietinus, which I need to learn more about, starting here...) a Lesser Whitethroat and 2 Wheatears, all new-in since the morning. 

Little Bunting

Glaucous Gull

Blackcap

Chiffchaff (abietinus..?)

The 27th was something of a re-run of the previous day; Houlland was checked first with Chiffchaff lingering, plus new Blackcap, Robin, Redwing and Song Thrush. Baliasta had 2 more Redwings, the burn in Burrafirth still held a Yellow-brow, and we stopped to see the Snow Bunting in the small quarry near the Quoys junction. 

Snow Bunting

Norwick (the area from Leawart to Valyie) had a few migrants present, with 2 Robins, 2 Redstarts, 2 Lesser Whitethroats, 1 Song Thrush, 2 Yellow-brows, 2 Willow Warblers, 1 Chiffchaff, 3 Goldcrests, and a roosting Long-eared Owl, plus an elusive Little Bunting which had been found the day before. Nearby, a showy Purple Sandpiper was on the beach (which we'd missed previously) and the willows at the bottom of the hill on the Skaw road had one each of Willow Warbler and Chiffchaff, and a Whinchat.

Redstart

Long-eared Owl

Purple Sandpiper

It was then back to the cliffs. Lamba Ness held 2 Redstarts, 1 Pied Flycatcher, 2 Robins, 3 Song Thrushes, 1 Mealy Redpoll, 2 Wheatears and 3+ Blackbirds, with the same wader selection as yesterday plus a Common Sandpiper. The Skaw cliffs held a Spotted Flycatcher, 2 Wheatears, 2 Song Thrushes, 1 Goldcrest, 1 Willow Warbler, 1 Lesser Whitethroat, 1 Robin and 1 Snow Bunting, with the juv Glauc and Risso's Dolphins still offshore, and 1 plus 5 Grey Herons. So no biggie - in fact, I would have settled for an RB Fly... The buildings at Skaw still held a Lesser Whitethroat, plus a fresh looking Reed Warbler. 

The cliffs at Lamba Ness

Pied Fly

Spotted Fly

Risso's Dolphins

Lesser Whitethroat

Finally, a check of the quarry at Hagdale failed to produce the Bluethroat which Paul French's Shetland Nature group had found earlier - all we could manage was a Grey Wag. 

And so today (28th)... the wind was howling from the south-east, and we had some rain from 11, making conditions very difficult for birding (and for birds). In fact, we gave up by about 1, after 5 hours of battling. We gave Houlland a miss as we knew it would be completely blown-out, and headed to Lund. Any hopes this might be a bit more sheltered, being on the western side of the island, were quickly dashed, and a slog through the thistles produced little more than a Blackcap, a Whinchat, a Song Thrush and 3 Redwing. 

The thistles at Lund

Nearby at Westing, the docks along the beach held a Yellow-brow, a Willow Warbler and a Lesser Whitethroat, and the willows held a Redstart, whilst a flock of c.200 Golden Plover did not hold a Yank. A flying visit to Uyeasound allowed us to pad our trip list with a few new species of wildfowl, including single Pintail and Gadwall, but the American Wigeon found earlier in the week was still gone. At Burrafirth the Yellow-brow had gone, replaced by a Reed Warbler; our third of the trip, and contrasting with last year where we had just one, but 4 Blyth's Reeds. A single Redwing was also present, whilst the Shore Station was pretty uninspiring, as it mainly seems to be. 

We then got wind of an RB Fly at Skaw. Despite ourselves, we decided to go and twitch it. However, even though Dave Cooper and his dad had seen it just a few minutes before we arrived. we couldn't find hide nor hair of it, despite multiple sweeps. It's never good when you can't find a bird you know is present... what else are you missing?!  2 Blackcap, 2 Robin, the Reed Warbler, 1 Chiffchaff, 1 Wheatear, and a Siskin could, however, be found. 

Skaw

So, with howling south-easterlies set to continue tomorrow (Friday), plus rain, it's likely to be another slow day...

Unst 2017: Days 0-2

It can't quite believe its a year since I was last on Unst... time does indeed fly. However, I'm not complaining, as it's great to be back up here again, thrashing up burns and through iris beds. This year there are just the two of us, me and Paul Eele, staying in a cosy little two bedroom cottage in Baliasta, called Scraefield.

We left Newark promptly at 7am on Saturday morning (23rd), Paul having come across from Norfolk the previous evening. After an uneventful drive up, we arrived in Aberdeen in plenty of time for the ferry. For the first hour or so out of port we did some seawatching from deck, with 4 Arctic Skuas being the highlight, along with a couple of Harbour Porpoises. Retiring inside, we settled down in the bar, noting that there seemed to be only a handful of other birders on the boat, which was a bit surprising. We flaked out about 9.30 for a slightly unsettled sleep in the sleeping pods, not helped by some quite lumpy seas between Orkney and Shetland!

Leaving Aberdeen

Having arrived on Sunday (24th) and picked up some bits in the Lerwick Tesco we headed north up Mainland, stopping for a couple of hours at Sandgarth, in Voe. This is a cracking looking site, although possibly with too much cover... We bagged our first Yellow-brows of the trip here, with three in evidence. A party of Redpolls gave us the runaround but eventually showed well enough to see they included at least two Mealies. 1 or 2 Goldcrests were the only other migrants here.

Sandgarth

Paul bagging a YBW

Two ferries later, we arrived on Unst, and were out in the field by 2.30. Around our cottage in Baliasta we had a nice male Brambling, and single Garden Warbler and Blackcap. We failed to see anything at all at Houlland, in increasingly blowy conditions, so went round to Skaw, which was a bit more sheltered and where another Garden Warbler was accompanied by two Blackcaps. We rounded things off with our fourth YBW of the day in the burn at Burrafirth.

Scraefield. Bijou.

Brambling

Today (25th), we were up and out in reasonable time, and straight to Houlland, where there some birds unlike yesterday - one apiece of Reed Warbler, YBW, Chiff and Song Thrush. Back to Scraefield, and a Blackcap was knocking around but not much else. Next stop was Baltasound, where there were 2 YBW, 2 Blackcaps and a Chiff in the area around the post office. On to Halligarth, and after a chat with Brydon T we worked the site. Best here was a Common Rosefinch which popped out in front of me and sat up in a small sycamore for a couple of moments before vanishing - perhaps the bird seen in Baltasound most recently as Thursday? Single YBW, 2 Chiffs and 2 Blackcaps completed proceedings here.

Rosefinch

A wander at Norwick was pretty quite, with single YBW and Song Thrush at Valyie, a flight-only Lesser Whitethroat and 8 Swallows south. There were a few waders on the beach, with around 20 Turnstone, a Sanderling, a few Ringos, and a Little Stint that dropped in for a moment before haring off south, calling. The small clump of trees in the valley at Northdale held a Barred Warbler, present for several days now, and another very skulking and flighty Lesser Whitethroat, with a Chiff and a YBW in the Rosa by the cottages. At Burrafirth, the YBW was still in the burn, and we kicked up a Jack Snipe. By now the weather was pretty grim, so we decided to have one last stop before calling it a day - Setters Hill Estate. This produced our eighth YBW of the day, along with 2 Chiffs and our first Robin.

YBW in typical habitat, on an Armco barrier.

With winds still set firm from the south-east, its all to play for over the next couple of days!

Hard work in Lincs

The 16th was a productive day on the patch, with first two Ravens circling over the south, and then a young Red-crested Pochard on Ferry Lane Lake- bit new for the year. Other things included 3 Curlew, 6 Dunlin, 1 Oystercatcher, 14 Pochard, 40 Wigeon, 32 Teal, 9 Shoveler and 2 Pintail. A few days later, the number of Pintail has increased to three, whilst the only waders were two each of Dunlin, Green Sand and Snipe. 

In between, I had a visit to the Lincs coast with a few other guys. We began at Gibraltar Point, which was slow. We failed to find any Yellow-brows (although two were seen at Aylmer Avenue), and had to make do with a handful of 'common' migrants. Best perhaps were 2 Spoonbills which flew inland, and a couple of Arctic Skuas offshore, plus my first Pinks of the autumn. Similarly, a walk at Chapel Six Marshes and then along Wolla Bank to Anderby Creek again failed to produce much, but it was good to reccy another bit of the Lincs coast that I've not birded before. 

No waders, and no seabirds

Over the last week or so I've been checking Mons Pool in the hope of a decent wader - a Pec would've been nice! Or even a just a Ruff... However, Hagg Lane Flash has evidently been intercepting all of them, and I had to make do with up to 2 juv islandica Black-wits, and up to 4 Dunlin... and that's been about it. Aside from waders, a juv or female Garganey was on Wharf Pit on the 10th with the Teal, and there has been a distinctly autumnal feel, with the first Meadow Pipits of the season, a small arrival of Wigeon (ok, just 6, but its a start), some big groups of House Martins - and still the odd Swift. 

Yesterday I checked Kilvington Lakes on the way home from work, in the vain hope of a windblown seabird. The best I could managed, however, were 6 Ringed Plover, 2 Greenshank, 2 Swifts and at least 3 YLGs. There was also what looked like an adult Caspian Gull amongst the LBBGs, but it was on the far side of the lake and into the sun. 

Catching up

Spotted Flycatcher is not a guaranteed species each year on the patch, although thus far during the PWC era I have managed to see one (or sometimes more) annually. I was beginning to worry this year, and to look enviously at nearby patches in Lincs which have recorded them recently. 

I'd been checking the usual spots at Collingham, especially the big ashes along Northcroft Lane, without luck. However, on Sunday I met John Ellis at the new hide on the north side of Mons Pool, and having had a good chat, was just about to leave when I noted something flick up onto the fence by the hide on the opposite side of the reserve - bingo, a Spotted Fly. I wandered round to get a photo just in time, as two horse riders came past, the bird flew, and I couldn't relocate it.

Spotted Flycatcher

One day I'll upgrade to a patch Pied Fly. 

Back to reality

After 2 and a half weeks in South Africa (of which more to follow...), it has been back to reality, birding the patch. Mark Dawson found a Wood Sand on my first day back (Friday), on the partially dewatered Wharf Pit, which remained until Sunday at least. This pit looks great, although water levels have been creeping back up, and has also held a Black-wit, up to 3 Greenshank (new for PWC 2017), up to 9 Green Sands, 2 Common Sands, single juv Ringed Plover and LRP, up to 7 Snipe, and up to 20 Little Egrets. We'll see what the coming days and weeks bring - a Pec Sand would be nice. 

Wood Sand with a Greenshank

Wharf Pit

Mons Pool, by contrast, has been disappointing, as all the water that has come out of Wharf Pit has gone there. The Garganey lingers, although it has always been hiding when I've looked for it. And that's about it, apart from 3 Curlew, contributing to patch wader diversity. 

I also had a look at Cotham Landfill on Friday, and realised I'd forgotten what I was doing with gulls. As well as quite a few ringed LBBGs (which I'm in the process of tracking the origins of), there was were looked like a juvenile Caspian, and an adult (or near adult), although both potentially had issues which I need to look into more closely when I have time. Pics below. 

More Yellow-legs

On Tuesday night I called into Kilvington Lakes on the way home. There were a small number of large gulls present, mainly LBBGs but also 3 adult or near adult Yellow-legs, and at least 2 juvs, including the one photo'd below with a juv LBBG.