Into the Black...

Some spicy seabirds and a heavy peppering of migrant passerines combined to produce a tasty few hours birding at the Point of Ayr this morning.

A ninety minute seawatch was slow to get going. The first thirty minutes were spent squinting at tiny black and white blobs on the horizon; the former almost certainly Common Scoters, the latter almost certainly not Little Gulls.

Thankfully a few birds started to fly out of the estuary close to the shore: first a female Scaup, followed a few minutes later by a cracking Fulmar.

Bird of the day though had probably been right in front of me for the past hour, but it was only when the sea began to calm on a weakening wind that a cracking winter-plumaged Black Guillmot revealed itself near the green buoy.

Quite an uncommon bird in these parts, but actually my second at the Point of Ayr - this bird following in the footsteps of an adult in breeding plumage that flew past during the gales of early September 2009.

After packing the scope up it was time to have a poke around the old colliery site. The bushes near the railway footbridge were dripping with Willow Warblers and Chiffchaffs. Impressive though this was, a massive forty-four Wheatears parked on the seawall near the lagoons stole the show...

Point of Ayr 2.4.11

1 Black Guillemot

4 Guillemot

1 Fulmar

1 Scaup (female)

200+ Common Scoter

3 Red-throated Diver

4 GC Grebe

1 Kestrel

44 Wheatear

5+ Willow Warbler

10+ Chiffchaff

Until later.