Hollesley and Boyton Marshes - 20/10/2021

Male STONECHAT, Boyton

Its hard to find new horizons in an area I know so well. The Suffolk Coast, although one of the best birding areas in the country, is overly familiar to me, so its often difficult to choose somewhere to visit that doesn't feel old. So the world turns and my attention turns to two of the smaller RSPB reserves at Hollesley and Boyton Marshes, and in keeping with this poor October there wasn't much to see.

The scrape at Hollesley is just about flooding with water again, the Hollesley Bay prison is in the background

Hollesley Marshes

One of the peculiarities of Hollesley Marshes is that they drain the scrape over the summer so that it just becomes a grassy field grazed by sheep. The scrape is the centrepiece to the reserve taking up a large chunk of the marshes and attracts most of the birds. By October it starts to re-wet itself and begins to attract birds back to its watery embrace. Despite the wet year we've had the scrape still held minimal water and as a result held few birds. just some ducks and waders.

Just the one SHELDUCK was present, at this time of year all shelducks migrate to the Baltic to moult

There were small numbers of TEAL and WIGEON, with five PINTAIL gracing the scrape, as well as some roosting CURLEW. Walking up to the river a female STONECHAT was perched on a fence post, but few other migrants. Hollesely is close to where the River Alde meets the sea and here the water was rushing in at a extreme speed, aided by the heavy winds. Against these winds a RED THROATED DIVER was trying to fly down river, but gave up as it was going nowhere and so flew sideways over Orford Ness and onto the sea. So a good few birds but nothing unusual, migration time just calls out for that rare bird that this year doesn't seem to deliver.

TEAL on the flooded pool, Boyton

Boyton Marshes  

As with every trip to Hollesley there's another one over to Boyton, its sister reserve. Managed as a farm Boyton is a sea of cattle pasture, flat marshland with reed fringed ditches and small pools of water. Again despite the wet year we've had, only one pool was flooded. On here were around seventy TEAL, with a small number of WIGEON, a SHELDUCK and some GODWIT. By this pool a male STONECHAT was perched, again, on a fence post. 

Cows graze the pasture in front of an anti-tank building dating from WW2

Walking up to the river wall the tide was very high, flooding the saltmarshes. The river here is tidal and a few CURLEW and REDSHANK were about, flying up and down but rarely alighting. A HARBOUR SEAL was on the river, as usual the visible head of this curious animal exposed, and as you look at it, it looks straight back at you. On the fields a pair of EGYPTIAN GEESE were displaying, the first time I've recorded a pair here, the onward march of this introduced bird.

A small flock of CHAFFINCHES were passing through Boyton farm

As you can see it was a quiet day over at the RSPB marshes, with few birds about. This was partly due to the lack of any flooding which attracts the ducks in, marshes are marshes after all. But I think it might be down to something else. These RSPB reserves are mere pin pricks in the countryside, and that even these places managed for wildlife aren't holding any birds. The outside world is just so hostile for wildlife that even those places that are kind to them just aren't enough. We needs lots and lots of land to be turned over to nature to halt this loss of wildlife, and we need to protect our wildlife, because otherwise our world will collapse. Scary times indeed, but just the start of the bad things that are to come.

 

The River Gipping - 14/10/2021

BLACK HEADED GULL

To be honest there isn't really much to report about in this post, a write up of the range of sites that lie along the river Gipping and all the birds they don't contain. I only really write this blog entry for a need to be complete in my birding write ups, to provide details about even this, the most quietest of birding sites. That's what I tell myself anyway, rather than seeing myself as a masochist, deliberately goading myself to see as few birds as possible. It was just a trip out to the Gipping to see what, if any, Autumn migration was taking place in the area.

GREAT TIT

As usual I parked up at Needham Lake, on the edge of Needham Market, and walked down the river to Pipp's Ford. Needham was, as usual, quiet, with lots of people walking round and fishing etc. there really is too much disturbance to attract any birds beyond the begging mongrelly MALLARDS and CANADA GEESE. There were six MUTE SWANS and one GREAT CRESTED GREBES the only truly wild birds. A KINGFISHER was an all to brief beautiful shot down the river.

EGYPTIAN & CANADA GEESE

It can be a bit of a slog getting down to the furthest lakes, even more so when there's few birds. The River Gipping held good numbers of GREY WAGTAILS all along the stretch of water, a bird at its peak migration. The first lake after Needham, Alderson Lake, is heavily fished and held no birds. A short walk further took me to the edge of the Pipp's Ford area with Riverside Farm Pit, a tiny little lake who's edges are grazed tight by horses. It doesn't attract many birds, but today, three EGYPTIAN GEESE were of interest, probably the largest number of this species I have seen in the area. MUTE SWANS have had a good breeding season, with three pairs raising young in the area, at Needham Lake, Riverside Farm Pit and Pipp's Ford Exhausted Quarry.

River Gipping

Once more there was a small trip down the river that led me to Pippin's Lake, another small lake surrounded by tall trees. This is usually the best water for DUCK numbers and today there were 28 GADWALL, 3 WIGEON, 2 COOT and 3 LITTLE EGRET, a decent haul for the time of year. Also present were a pair of GREEN SANDPIPER, one of the iconic birds of the area, they are seen pretty much all through the year at this site, all over the area. In the trees a SISKIN was heard, my first of the Autumn.

                                                                

                Active Quarry, looking like the surface of the moon

After Pippins Lake the Active Quarry is the next port of call, and to be honest it was birdless, typical for the day. Bleeding hell this was getting depressing, all I can ask is please give me some birds! And so it was one further trudge down the river to get to the Exhausted Quarry, and boy it wasn't worth the effort. The site had lost a lot of water, and as a result was fairly birdless except for a family of SWANS. And then I walked back to Needham fairly disappointed.

Pippin's Lake

I drove down to Barham Pits, telling myself there might be something about, but there was nothing on the barren lakes, and again I ask myself why I do this. Two KINGFISHERS were on Barham Pit B with three COOT, that was really it. Being the only birdwatcher in the area I tell myself this site needs my attention, and if I leave it a few months between visits, I can forget the previous trips, and convince myself that I need to visit again.

Having a good scratch: a pair of HIGHLAND COWS graze a meadow over the other side of the river to Papermill  Reedbeds

Rounding off a birdless day I had a look at the meadows around Papermill Reedbed, but I was able to get a quick glance of a STOAT which ran through the grass.

CANADA GEESE, Needham Lake

I have a conflict with writing about days like this, days when I wonder why I birdwatch and why I write this blog. Its just boring to write about and just as boring for you to read. And in the end its just trudging round the countryside with no aim, utterly pointless. But then another part of me needs to write something about this day, because for a site like this I'm the only one watching there, and because ignored sites like this need some attention every so often. And thinking like that is what gets me through another birdless visit and brings me back to see no birds again .

RED DEER rut at Minsmere - 12/10/2021

The first RED DEER stag

October is a standout month on the wildlife watcher's diary, as this is the season of the rut, when RED DEER stags battle for the control of the hinds. And Minsmere is one of the best places in the country to witness this rut as it contains the largest lowland deer herd in England. Usually they are best seen from Westleton Heath, in an area of heathy grassland fenced off from the public. When I was there the hinds were hiding in an area of gorse, but three stags were quite noticeable. All three were big beasts, with a good head of antlers.

The second stag came out from a clump of gorse

One of the stags appeared on cue from behind a clump of trees. As he appeared, across the heath another stag came out in the open. There was a stand off before one started calling, a low mournful sound, a sound that harkens back to our primordial roots. Then the second stag seemed to lose his nerve and ran off into the distance, casually followed by the first stag. A third stag hung back in the gorse where the hinds were hiding seeming to keep out of the way of the rut. Witnessing this standoff triggered something stoneage in myself, giving me an urge to pick up a spear and hunt those beasts.

The first stag saw the second off with no conflict

Its been an underwhelming Autumn so far, what may be considered the worst in recent history. Birds that should be passing through this island don't seem to have made it here so far. So what's up? well the right winds have just not been blowing, with heavy westerlies dominating this Autumn. Also the mild weather hasn't helped, as bad weather on the continent leads to birds being pushed to out relatively mild shores. But the thing is we just don't know. Bird migration is something poorly understood and much more complex than our science could fathom.

Two male SHOVELLER

As you could probably guess it was a quiet time at Minsmere, one of the quietest I have had at this reserve. Birds were of course present here, at this time of year wildfowl dominate with birds coming in and increasing for the winter months. A lot of the DUCKS spend the days sleeping, so the Scrape at this time of year is fairly quiet. TEAL are the most common duck here, with god numbers of SHOVELLER and GADWALL with smaller numbers of WIGEON. Three PINTAIL were a good record for this time of year and five COMMON SCOTER were seen in flight out at sea. The male ducks are now moulting out of their eclipse plumage, and are becoming more colourful to attract a mate over the winter.

Birds on Island Mere

Island Mere still had its flock of around a hundred GADWALL, sharing the water with twenty COOT and small numbers of both LITTLE and GREAT CRESTED GREBE and a few TUFTED DUCK. Outside of the Bittern Hide they were cutting back the reeds, so I saw nothing except a middle aged man forking and burning reeds which isn't a great sight to behold. The Scrape had also had a trim, with the reeds in front of North Hide having been cut back and West Scrape had also been opened up.

WIGEON, unusually for ducks feed on grass, and can be seen on the Scrape banks

GEESE dominate the scene at Minsmere, with hundreds of BARNACLE GEESE flocking, they seem to commute between here and Dingle Marshes further north, with skeins coming in and landing on the Scrape, and have become the most common goose on the reserve. These barnacles are descended from birds that escaped from some wildfowl collection on the continent and have now reached plague proportions here in Suffolk.

A large BARNACLE GEESE flock on the Scrape

Earlier in the season, WADER migration dominated the scene, but by October this migration had pretty much ground to a halt, despite some mud now being exposed. The best record was a CURLEW SANDPIPER on West Scrape, feeding on its own, October records are rather scarce so it was a good sighting, maybe the best today. Also present on West Scrape were three GREEN SANDPIPERS, whilst on East Scrape there were two RINGED PLOVER and the last AVOCET of the summer, a sign that winter is coming.

This LAPWING had a damaged wing, but there are few places better places to be stuck than the Scrape

Small bird movement is always the highlight of October and its a time to look out for a rarity, but today there just seemed to be no evidence of migration whatsoever. A STONECHAT was on the beach but there's usually some present at any time of year. A feature of October is the sight of BEARDED TITS 'erupting' from the reedbeds, when the breeding birds of the summer leave their home for the winter months. As a result they were quite noticeable today, their presence advertised by the metallic 'pinging' sound they make. They were seen at North Hide and Island Mere, they have a nice chestnut colour plumage, a long tail, and the males have this black mustache which gives them their name.

 

Pair of TEAL

When one of the best nature reserves in the country has so little bird life, something is wrong in the world of nature. The decline in bird numbers, although well documented, is finally becoming evident, there's just no birds left in our countryside, and our countryside is becoming quiet and empty. This is quite depressing to anyone with even the slightest interest in nature.

Alton Water - 11/10/2021

HERON

The peaceful, calm waters of the reservoir gently lap on the shoreline, a calm movement accentuated by the peaceful sound of the place. Out on the reservoir GULLS swirl about, as the shape of a GREAT CRESTED GREBE is silhouetted against the blue grey expanse. Alton Water, the largest area of fresh water in Suffolk, is a very manmade place that has bee softened by nature over time. And nature thrives in this area making it a good destination for local bird watching.

CORMORANT

Its been a year since I last visited the place, due to lockdowns, and a lack of leisure time, leading to less time for birding, leaving me to prioritise the better places to bird at. As a birding site Alton Water is a tough place to categorise. Due to its size and location it attracts many rare and unusual birds, but a lot of time it can be bleak and birdless. There have been times when I've turned up and all I've seen is a solitary coot. The mild sunny weather this October has meant that waterfowl are present in low numbers and there wasn't much about. When weather is harsher on the continent, birds get pushed to our more relatively mild climate, and we get large numbers of ducks turning up.

Female GOOSANDER

Today was a quiet day in a fairly uneventful Autumn migration time. Most unusual was an early female GOOSANDER, a nice redhead, seen from the northern hides. This female has arrived at the earliest date I have recorded the bird in Suffolk and is a first for me at Alton Water. Although a common winter visitor to reservoirs and gravel pits across the country, the relative lack of these habitats in Suffolk, makes it fairly scarce in this county. Otherwise, DUCKS were present in surprisingly small numbers at the reservoir as around thirty TUFTED DUCK were about, with small numbers of SHOVELLER and TEAL.

Pair of SWANS, note the red ring on the cobb's leg

With all the woodland planted around the edges of the reservoir there is lots of room to give the smaller birds a home. There have been influxes of BALCKBIRDS and GOLDCRESTS recently, the latter forming small flocks, twinkling in the trees, and among some of the flocks there were some TREECREEPERS about. An area of scrub in the Dogs Tail held a female BULLFINCH, which is a nice record, as I haven't seen too many of them recently. Also about on the Dogs Tale were two KINGFISHERS an all too brief sighting, little shots of sapphire blurring past at rocket speed.

Gaggle of GREYLAGS

Its always a shame that the best of days for being outside, like the warm sunny day today, are always the worst for birdwatching. It seems to have been a very poor Autumn migration so far, not merely for rare birds but also the more common or just scarce ones. And its not just for me, across the country it seems to be the same, and I wonder if something has gone wrong, have bird populations crashes, or is it that just the winds have been blowing in the wrong direction. This may be nothing or it maybe the beginning of the end, a little blip or something more serious?

The last day in Shetland - 24/9/2021

Where would a blog about Shetland be without a photo of a pony 

And so it comes to an end, my holiday was all too brief, and now I write the last post of my time in Shetland. Typing this up in October it now seems so long ago, yet only three weeks have passed since I was last there. It seems unreal, like a part of my life separate from everything else, not sharing the same timeline as the rest of my life. 

SANDERLING, the wader of sandy beaches

Today was one of the better days, with a few decent sightings, although nothing particularly unusual. Today we really didn't have any plan, and travelled to a lot of places we visited previously, but with little to show for them. It was frustrating to visit these sites again and again with nothing really to see at any of them. Most of these sites I have written about on previous posts, so today there's not much more to write about. We spent eight hours a day looking for birds, and as you can see from the briefness of this blog, we didn't really have anything of note to see.

Spiggie Beach

From the place we stayed in for the last four nights of this holiday in Shetland, the Sumburgh Hotel, there was a short walk down to the sea. Here a rocky shoreline held the sea at bay. Every morning, before breakfast we would walk down to take a look and see what was around, and it was the usual fare, the kind of birds seen around the island. One member of the party kept seeing a PURPLE SANDPIPER, which he would prove by taking a picture to show he wasn't fibbing. Every morning everyone else would look for the bird with no luck and we wondered what we had to do to see the bird. So today the whole group went down to have a look and finally! we got to see not just one bird but three. A good total, but this was a bird I was expecting to see a lot of on this trip.

Three WHOOPER SWANS, Scatness, those big yellow and black bills differentiate them from our mutes

The only new place that had anything of note was Quendale Bay, a bit further on from Quendale, where we saw the first red breasted flycatcher. From the elevated land we had decent views of the bay. Best birds were the three or so GREAT NORTHERN DIVERS, massive and distinctive birds, but again a species we should have seen more of on the holiday, this area of the world should have held more of this bird. Also present were three female COMMON SCOTER, distant views on the sea, which again are not particularly much of note, you can see thousands off the coast of Titchwell, but they were a holiday tick I guess.

Jarlshof is an ancient settlement right next to our hotel, I would go visit in the morning. The central building is the lord's manor, whilst the commoner people would live in smaller settlements spread around.

This is the last post about my holiday in Shetland and its a shame really as now it feels like its finally over. As you can probably work out, I was fairly disappointed with the trip, just because there were no birds about. I felt at times that we could have visited more places, maybe explore some sites in more detail and it felt that there must have been birds out there if we really looked for them. This was my one opportunity to visit Shetland, so far in my life and I just felt a little underwhelmed by  it all, really. Like so many things in life, bird migration is a lottery, nothing can predict it, but I didn't expect to see it at its most inactive.

The Dreaded Day - 23/9/2021

Pair of HERRING GULLS

It was coming but I didn't really think it was going to happen - the day we saw nothing. I exaggerate of course, we did have some nice sightings, but with winds so forceful that you couldn't exit the minibus, it would prove to be a non-day.

RAZORBILL

So with 60mph south-westerlies, meaning there was no chance of leaving the van, let alone looking for birds, we just drove around. By the time we hit midday we ended up going to Lerwick, the capitol of Shetland, for something non-birding to do.

SHAG

Lerwick

Lerwick was a picturesque little town with some nice little shops and despite the urban (or what passes for urban in Shetland) location there were still some good sightings to be had of birds and mammals at close quarters. The lack of food in our oceans which has disastrously affected our seabirds, has meant that a lot of these birds are looking anywhere for food, taking them into close quarters with humans, which they wouldn't normally do. There are some sad records of emaciated sea birds washing up dead on our shores, with chicks dying of hunger. However it did provide the opportunity for some close photography of birds that would usually be miles out at sea. A BLACK GUILLEMOT, a RAZORBILL and a SHAG all posed for a nice photo as they swam around the harbour. These birds came so close, you could almost reach out and grab them. The RAZORBILL, dived and we could see it swim underwater, chasing a shoal of fish, with its stubby wings, it looked like it was flying through the water. 

Lerwick Harbour

Perhaps the most magical experience of the entire holiday in Shetland played itself out in the harbour. As we were hanging out by the water a shout came across of 'OTTER' and grabbing a pair of bins we ran over to the water's edge, and there was a pair of this elusive animal. Completely unfazed by being stared at, one of the otters came swimming over until it reached within ten metres of us. As it neared us it started calling out in this high pitched wheezing sound. It swam around for a couple of minutes before leaving the harbour entirely, not in the slightest bit fazed by the attention. 

OTTER in Lerwich Harbour

After the excitement of Lerwick, the winds in the afternoon  had calmed down a bit so we ventured out to look for some more birds, although there weren't many about. We visited a lot of places we had previously been to but with little luck. At one site, Western Quarff, upon examining a patch of stunted sycamores, a RED BREASTED FLYCATHCER was found, the second of the trip, as usual flying out of the clump to pose on a fence wire. Its amazing how such a small patch of trees could harbour any birds at all, and hide them so well it took some finding to see it. That was the last sighting of the day.

A RED BREASTED FLYCATCHER was found in this patch of trees

Sometimes on this holiday it just felt that things weren't really going my way. Watching birds is subject to the forces of nature, and when they aren't on your side there's really nothing you can really do. However when things are the other way round, you can witness the majesty of nature and feel quite humbled. That's part of the joy of bird watching, you just have no control at all, and in the end you just have to accept the way things are.

St Ninnians, East Burra & Loch of Spiggie - 22/9/2021

SANDERLING (R) with a RINGED PLOVER (l)

I seldom got blown away by the scenery of Shetland, but St Ninnian's stands up there as the most beautiful location I saw in this archipelago. Its the best example of TOMBOLO in the country, a sand spit which links the island of St Ninnian's to the mainland. It was a gorgeous example of the kind of beaches you get up in this part of the world, beautiful white sand and turquoise sea, sort of what you would expect from the Caribbean, but with the bonus of being empty of people. When I was there the clouds opened up and the sun beat down to illuminate the vistas and it was just great walking on the sand, I just wished I had more time to spend here, but we had to look for birds.

A TOMBOLO, a stretch of sand that links an offshore island to the mainland

Looking towards the island of ST Ninnian's across the tombolo from the mainland

After the struggles of the past two days, with lots of effort being put into finding few birds, things picked up today, and there were a few more birds present around the islands. For a base we had moved to the Sumburgh Hotel in the most southern part of Mainland near the airport and Grutness. 

As it pretty much happened for the entire holiday, the wind was still blowing in the wrong direction, strong westerlies, which provided no help what so ever. The best winds for bird migration is a blow from the north east, the exact opposite direction, which explains the dearth of migrants. In the morning various skeins of PINK FOOTED GEESE flew over, providing good examples of migration happening before my eyes.

On Shetland there are few estuaries or mudflats and the first port of call for today was a visit to one of them. The mud on the Pool of Verkie, would prove to be a fertile feeding ground for a small collection of WADERS. The best of the sightings would be another LITTLE STINT, after the one the other day, my second record for Scotland, and a wader not often seen on mudflats. A flock of around twenty BLACKWITS was an interesting collection of birds, this was the only record for the holiday, and not a bird I often see in Scotland. A couple of KNOT were about as well, along with all the usual waders we had seen in other places, all in small numbers.

TURNSTONE and a SANDERLING (C)

Having seen a KING EIDER on the 19 September, it was time to see a second, this one located on a sea loch at East Burra. Again it was a daunting prospect, although this time it was much further in, close enough to make out, it was just amongst a flock of several hundred EIDER. It still amazes me how I was able to see it, but I did, the magic of expensive optics. Again it was differentiated by the orange bill, and it had a slightly different shape. Not a shower, but still a tick I guess.

One place I wanted to visit was Loch of Spiggie, an RSPB reserve, the largest loch in Shetland. Laying eyes on it, I was surprised at the size of it; it was a huge expanse of water stretching to the horizon. Despite this size, wildfowl numbers were fairly low, as is typical for lochs of Shetland. A flock of 30 of both MUTE and WHOOPER SWANS were about with small flocks of WIGEON and TEAL. More interest was provided by distant views of three GOLDENEYE and there were also a few SLAVONIAN GREBES about, dark specks even through a telescope, you differentiate them through their shape, which you learn through experience.

RINGED PLOVER, a common wader on the beaches of Shetland

Half a mile from the south of Loch of Spiggie, lies Spiggie Beach, another exotic looking location. Loch of Spiggie was originally a sea loch which got silted up to cut it off from the sea and so the beach was formed. The usual SMALL WADERS were present running up and down the shoreline. What was interesting was a small WARBLER seen distantly on some rocks. Our tour leader, desperate for any sighting of a rarity, climbed over a series of rocks, risking his life in the pursuit of: a WILLOW WARBLER. Worthwhile, but he was willing to put his life in jeopardy for a common holiday tick, that's dedication.

Spiggie Beach

Being an isolated piece of moorland, Shetland is home to few birds of prey. Probably the most common is the MERLIN, which is also the smallest. We would see individuals of this species from the minibus usually flying low across the landscape. We had a couple of records of KESTRELS and SPARROWHAWKS, which are actually quite scarce in a place with no trees. 

Another one from Spiggie Beach

And so the end of another post, one that's a bit more enjoyable to write about as it means I have seen some birds and visited various interesting places. Its good to write this blog right now on a cold October night in Ipswich, going through all the good memories I have of this holiday. All that was needed was a few more birds and it would have been a classic.

DOTTEREL and that's about it -21/9/2021

I was fairly optimistic that yesterday was a blip and today was going to be a return to seeing lots of birds. However it was a bit of a no-show this day, which is how the rest of my tour of the islands of Shetland would pan out. For what has been a fairly quiet year for me bird wise, with the lockdown closing off the first quarter, I had plenty of birds to see to get back on track, and I thought this holiday would help. I mean there's nothing like going to Shetland, to really get to see some birds. But it just wasn't the case, and I was barely making any year ticks on this holiday (year ticks, in case you don't know, are the bird sightings for the year) let alone lifers.

As the title of the post makes obvious, the only bird of note today was a DOTTEREL. Like all the best sightings it was completely unplanned. Whilst searching through a flock of GOLDEN PLOVER in Stenness, our leader came across a slightly smaller bird in the flock. 'DOTTEREL!' came the shout, and everyone turned to scout through the plovers. It took a bit of searching but when I found it the bird became obvious and provided a good view of what can be hard bird to get close to. The dotterel was slightly smaller than the goldens, with a white eye stripe and an all brown plumage. The dotterel is a type of plover that nests in the highlands of Scotland, and for this species the roles of the sexes are reversed, with males looking after the young, and the females having the brighter plumage for a change. 

GOLDEN PLOVER, it was among a flock of these birds that I got the sighting of the DOTTEREL

You sometimes get DOTTERELS wandering through East Anglia on passage, but for Shetland this was the rarest bird we would see for the islands on the entire holiday. GOLDEN PLOVERS were fairly common, flocking on areas of short grassland throughout the islands, we would see them most days, nice birds, their big black eyes make them seem so sweet and innocent.

A good place we went to was Eshaness, but it was more for a photographic opportunity providing some stunning cliffs battered by the sea with massive waves to take pictures of. Winds were strong and not much was seen except a couple of ROCK PIPTS, common enough birds of the rocky coasts of Shetland. Most of the photos in this post was taken there. Its sort of the typical coast habitat of extreme cliffs, with tightly grazed grassland above. I think we went here so the leaders could come up with something for us to do today.

Scatness was a medium sized lowland loch where we pinned the hopes of seeing some birds, waterfowl this time. We visited in the afternoon, and parked on the top of a hill, looking down with good views of the loch below, amongst moorland. There was a good assortment here for Shetland, because amongst the WHOOPERS and WIGEON, two PINTAIL were about, and some SHOVELLERS, which seem to be rare in Shetland. Two PALE BELLIED BRENT GEESE flew in to join the show, a fairly rare bird on Shetland, in Suffolk we get the dark bellied kind, so they were a bit exotic for me.

A youngish HERRING GULL

Days on which not much happens are so much easier to write up, as I have less to type, and don't have to worry about leaving things out. But on the other side it was becoming obvious that the holiday was petering out under the lack of birds and my first visit to Shetland was turning into a dud, not really what I wanted on visiting these haloed isles. I know that on the flip side I was visiting this place for the first time, where everything was new to me, I was meeting new people, and having large hearty meals in the evening, so I can't really complain. There are two sides to everything.