Donkey's wanger of a seawatch

Today was the first day I could get away from work early, and with a northerly breeze there was a chance of some lost birds struggling up the coast. I sat at work in the morning with reports of Sab's Gulls, Long-tailed Skuas (Jaegers) and the odd Great Shearwater and Yellow-browed Warbler up the east coast and was starting to itch. At 2 o'clock I got a call from a journalist who wanted a photo of a cross-looking birder with bins stood on the SSSI sand dunes that Donald Trump wants to f*** up with his golf course. So he needed a media whore, and of course he thought of me. Sorry, mate, I'm away birding. And I was. Holy Guano - to the the cliffs, Batman!

And the omens were good, if a Short-tailed Vole of THIS quality can be a good omen. It was sat on the rocks as if placed by the god of small mammals for me to find.

And immediately it was obvious there was something on - 2 hours from 15:34 - 17:42 but straight away there were Sooty Shearwaters going past in 2s and 3s - a total of 50 in all, mostly in the first hour. Much smaller numbers of 9 Manx Shearwaters, usually closer in, but a wee diminutive 'Sooty' going past at 2 km with a flock of normal Sooties had a smudgy white belly because it was a Balearic Shearwater. Sweet! A juvenile Arctic Skua (Parasitic) went north, then a flurry of ducks (ducks) - 28 Eurasian Teal N, then 2 Velvet Scoters carrying a Mallard with them, then another 7 Mallards and a Tufted Duck. Gasp in amazement, Inglis birders, but the Tufted Duck was a base 5 patch tick of unprecedented occurrence on my Newtonhill list. Later on I was to get 6 Red-breasted Mergansers going south, and a single female Goosander (Common Merganser) going north, the latter a valuable patch year tick.

Another juvenile skua going north a 1 km was difficult to get plumage detail on, but was a cold dark bird, very small and was a provisional jizz id of Long-tailed Skua. However I almost forgot to write it down, because of the excitement that followed. Warning, this is going to sound stringy - at least I'd call it stringy if I read it, but I'll tell you what I saw... which is at 16:00 a large shearwater going north at 2 km with 4 Sooties, which on the basis of what everyone else has been seeing recently I would have assumed would be 'just' a Great Shearwater'. But it wisnae. The head appeared all uniform dark, and at this range I would have seen the dark cap of Great Shearwater, also the upperparts were milky coffee and the underparts were clean white - no dusky belly shite. It looked like a Cory's Shearwater, which is what it was... not only on the basis of lack-of-great-shear-features, but also the relaxed flight, shearing on wings bent back and angled down too...total classic Cory's... except that I tend to assume that other people are stringing when they come out with crap like this. Maybe I should be more understanding. Cracking bird, followed 10 minutes later by bloody hell, a juvenile Sabine's Gull! Have I been good in a previous life or something and I'm getting all my rewards in one afternoon? Swanning north like it didn't care. I watched it disappear out of sight, with only a couple of Sooties to distract me. :-O

In between good birds I was mostly going goggle-eye trying to count Northern Gannets (249 N, 2 S), Black-legged Kittiwakes (182 N), and Guillemots/Razorbills (717 N). Only 7 Atlantic Puffins. One of the groups of Kittiwakes had an adult Little Gull in there (keep 'em coming). Also 16 Pink-footed Geese went south, 3 Red-throated Divers north (and 1 south), and 4 commic terns N. Annoying small waders, included the easy ones to identify i.e. 2 Ringed Plovers N, and 2 Purple Sandpipers - my first of the autumn.