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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Jos Stratford" data-source="post: 3189529" data-attributes="member: 12449">11 March. The Nemuro Peninsula.Blizzard over, mostly sun and high cloud throughout the day ...but exceptionally windy, a south-westerly gale battering the headlands. My plan for this day had been to wake up and have a celebratory breakfast at Washinoyado, patting myself on the back for such grippling views of the owls, then spent the day exploring Rausu Harbour and perhaps the Notsuke Peninsula. Of course however, the reality was I now far to the south with an unexpected extra day on the Nemuro Peninsula!Arriving at Hattaushi Bridge at 5 a.m., I still managed to miss dawn, so saw a Hazel Grouse pattering alongside the stream instead of any owls. I then decided to spend the better part of the day looking for Red-faced Cormorants. The search began with a return to Ochiishi-misaki ...but gee, with a change in the wind, the previously excellent shelter was now in the full blast of the wind, the lea of the building offering slight respite but not a great deal. Rough seas, almost no notable passage. There was however a large gathering of cormorants on a cliff face just to the east, there just had to be a Red-faced Cormorant amongst them I thought! On a nice calm day, viewing this cliff would have been a simplicity,  I would merely needed to have sat on the nice grassy slope and scope across to them. In this buffeting wind however I was rather concerned that I would simply get blown off! Try as I might – standing, sitting, lying flat on my stomach, I simply could not get an angle where I could both see the cliff and keep my scope still enough to scan though them! A flock of about 30 cormorants departed from the cliff an hour or so later, one possible Red-faced Cormorant seemed to be in their midst. However, with the sun angle and wind not conducive to better chances to observe, I decided to depart and return later in the day.After a stint in Ochiishi harbour, photographing the gulls, I moved round to Nossapa-misaki for another try there. Also very little movement on the very rough sea, but again a large gathering of cormorants, this time on a rock pinnacle just north of the lighthouse. Here, and across all the sites visited today, a massive influx of Bramblings had occurred, many thousands pouring in, flocks feeding on this exposed headlands and aside roads wherever the snow had retreated a few centimetres. So, as the car rocked about, I sat and waited ...photographing Bramblings sheltering beneath tussocks, watching the cormorants come and go on the pinnacle. Two hours on, a scan across the birds gathered and there he was, a solitary Red-faced Cormorant amongst the many Pelagics! Ah success, the last of my remaining targets on Hokkaido had fallen ...bar the owl of course!For much the rest of the day I pottered about, visiting various bays and harbours and struggling out to the lighthouse at Ochiishi again where the cliff certainly held no Red-faced Cormorants in the end. Concluding the day, I returned to the now familiar Hattaushi Bridge. Still windy, I didn't expect very much ...and surprise surprise, didn't see very much either! As darkness fell, I left the area, driving to the hinterlands of Kushiro. At dawn, wind, rain or blizzard permitting, a treat would await me.</blockquote>

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