remember october88 mike,hundreds of leachs and loads of full adult lt skuas at arms length ..oh the memories!!Mike Pennington said:As someone who ticked off Leach's Petrel at Red Rocks in 1978 and was at Seaforth in early 80s on one of the first good Storm Petrel days I'm quite jealous of all this. Almost wish I was there! It's made all nostalgic for the old days.
Just have to do with a Booted Warbler 50m from the house and a couple of Rosefinches I suppose, but I can't get to Whalsay for the Brown Shrike, not enough time between end of school and dusk.
sparrowbirder said:remember october88 mike,hundreds of leachs and loads of full adult lt skuas at arms length ..oh the memories!!
sparrowbirder said:remember october88 mike,hundreds of leachs and loads of full adult lt skuas at arms length ..oh the memories!!
Jane Turner said:Reader...
Check the shipping forecast at midnight.. even 6am Sat morning... if the winds are 6+ W to NW there will almost certainly be a few petrels on the Sat evening tide at New Brighton and I'm guessing those LTSkuas are fixtures
Reader said:Hi jane
As a landlocked birder that doesn't get to do much sea watching I am not as adept as you experts at knowing what is good or not so good with predicted conditions.
I went into the Met Office web site and at 21:10 this is what the forecast states.
Colwyn Bay to the Mull of Galloway including the Isle of Man.
24 hour forecast:
Wind: northwest 3 or 4 backing southwest overnight, perhaps reaching 6 for a time, veering west later.
Weather: rain later.
Visibility: moderate or good.
Sea State: slight or moderate.
Outlook for the following 24 hours:
Wind: west 3 or 4 backing southwest 6 to gale 8.
Weather: rain at times.
Visibility: moderate or good.
Sea State: moderate.
What would this mean in terms of conditions and where to go. I doubt very much if I will still be up at midnight and will almost certainly be up your end by 6am.
John Malloy said:I made the effort to travel from Northumberland on Wednesday - well worth the journey. Leach's were seen from the car while putting waterproofs on at New Brighton and were later observed from less than 10ft as they passed the shoreline! Bonus birds included 2 Long-tailed Skua, 1 1w Sabines Gull, a couple of Manxies (also venturing close to the shore) and a few Gannets. Pallid Swift on the way home was a bonus too!
Images attached was taken from the shore, despite being clse they were very difficult to photograph in blustery conditions! (My camera was caked with sand by the time I'd finished!)
John
On the subject of local information - I know Jane (who sends me her sightings) won't mind me mentioning my website on this thread - Dee Estuary Birding, I'm sure anyone thinking of visiting the Dee Estuary and North Wirral coast will find it useful.Rob Smallwood said:By the way - to all those who have either enjoyed this thread or taken the opportunity to use the information to catch up with Leach's etc - what a great lesson Jane has taught us all - good quality local information is priceless in enhancing our enjoyment of our hobby.
Don't take for granted that others will know what you know - and provided that you aren't divulging sites for breeding birds I am looking fowrward to other similar threads.
The "How to see..." series starts here?
I quote from the 1978 Cheshire Bird Report - "Early on 30th (Sept) quite phenomenal numbers were present, with some hundreds off Seacombe Ferry (in the River Mersey). On the ebbing tide an incredible number moved out of the river past large numbers of observers stationed at New Brighton. No accurate counts have been submitted, but a conservative estimate is of 800 petrels". There were 959 seen from Hilbre a few days earlier on the 27th Sept which is the all time record. Unfortunately I missed all this but have spoken to someone who was at Seacombe on the 30th, just 'clouds of Petrels over the river'!Jane Turner said:The 950+ Leach's in a day in 1978 takes some beating and 6... 6 Long-tailed Skuas sat in the dips at Leasowe! I had just started ringing in 1978 and was a bit grudging of the crap conditions for mist-netting that autumn... mind you.. the one day the wind stopped (Sept 28th) a Great-spotted Cuckoo turned up!