A brief hour at Musselburgh on Friday had an adult med gull on the scrapes with 800+ golden plovers. There were over 15 snipe with some feeding in the grass just 5 metres from the hide. An unusually bold lapwing also fed feet away. I wish I had had my camera though others wil be merciful that I did not.
Yesterday was a pretty wet windy day. However it dried up late afternoon and I headed for Aberlady. Right on cue as I arrived the heavens opened and I took shelter in the car. 20 mins of heavy rain ensued but then things looked up. First, tuned into the radio, Hibs prodigal son stuck in the winner and then Killie scored to humiliate Edinburgh's lesser team. The rain stopped and off I went. A short eared owl was out hunting. And then the geese started to come in. This weeks count at 24000 is the reserves third highest ever. For 45 minutes wave after wave of birds came in, the noise terrific, sometimes birds arriving from 3 directions at once
On the way back at around 5.45ish I passed a man with gun and bag of decoys. He walked straight out on to the marsh, set out a line of decoy ducks and put them in to the water. This caused a fair bit of disturbance sending a lot of the geese scattering. He the lay down presumably to await an opportunity to shoot. Presumably he had a licence for wildfowling but it surprised me to see this on a nature reserve. As I drove away the whole 20000+ geese flew up and circled, possibly because this man had shot at something. I'll maybe email the warden to see whathe has to say
Not much else today, things have slowed abit in Lothian migrant-wise?
