Fascinating Fact Post

Posts with the word 'post' in the title are revisited more often and for longer than any others. Strange but true! Well, on this blog, anyway. I have no idea why.

Ok, so... Another weekend of being careful about my bloody tendons [[I mean really... Who invented these daft things that don't heal???]] and bashing the Patch. Not that this was a pointless or fruitless endeavour. Well, depending on your definitions of 'pointless' and 'fruitless'...

Today, despite a vaguely interesting-looking frontal system coming in, I decided against lugging the Big Scope down to the Nose, or anywhere else. Not that I didn't look at the sea. But before we get to that, there is Saturday, is there not?

Having had a fair bit of weather through, I decided to take the li'l scope rather than bins, and see what could be seen on the sea. With the calm conditions, I was hoping to sneak a Red-breasted Merganser for the Patch Yearlist - they count on the sea or in the air as long as I'm in the Patch, after all, so one hanging about off Broadsands would be ok. IF I could see it. I figured the extra reach would make the difference, and that taking the scope as well as the bins was too much for Urban Birding [which is a fair point]. [[Have I gone on about Urban Birding? I'm not sure. ::Makes mental note to bore you at some point::]]

With its 20x, the li'l scope is quite useable hand-held in its grippa case, [though I prefer a shoulderpod for proper birding], but it naturally has issues with close-range passerines in bushes and trees, due to narrower FOV, depth of field, and slower focussing than bins. I wasn't expecting anything spectacular on that front though, so shouldn't have been surprised by all the bands of tits and crests I met... [Drat] At least I didn't hear anything calling I couldn't then get on, like a Hume's or a Dusky or something. Small mercies.

Instead of concentrating on the eastern end of the Torquay peninsula, I opted for the southern side, heading down the Ilsham valley, along Meadfoot, and then along the Coast Path to the Harbour. Its a very nice bit of path, that, wandering up and down the cliff until it dumps you out behind the Imperial Hotel. You get in amongst the cliff woods, those oh-so-evil non-native Holm Oaks [which I have no problem with - they hold the slopes together and provide year-round shelter and food for lots of birds.] and are treated to some wonderful views of the bay and of some very nice houses belonging to People With More Money Than You. They don't call it the English Riviera for nothing, you know. On a sunny day when its not blowing a hoolie, its quite something. Though picking birds on the sea when the sun shines is a pain.

I didn't see a Merganser. I didn't see a lot of anything, to be honest. A couple of GC Grebes and 3 Razorbills off Meadfoot was it. Later on, I went to Blackball to look for the evening grebe roost and found nothing. Nada. Not a single one. 310 Herring Gulls, a half-dozen Geebs, no GC Grebes. But that's later. Before that there were at least 7 Purple Sands and a Turnstone [plus Rockits] at the Real Living Coast. They were looking lovely in the sunshine, while in my ears the plaintive cries of the poor captive Choughs* in the Trawler Wreck made me think of bolt cutters...

[[*I can only vainly dream that one day they'll be released somewhere between Bolt Tail and Start Point, as is only fair compensation for giving the cornish Cirl Buntings back]]

Before even that, indeed right at the very start of the day, I had my Star Bird! Big White Thing flying south towards me. "That's no gull..." Its an Egret! Its being mobbed by Woodpigs!?!?? Its not a Great... Its still going over my house! Yes! Garden Tick!!!!! I'd always assumed that the Little Egrets you sometimes see stalking the rockpools of Tor Bay were from the Dart, after all, its only over there ::Point::, but this one was coming in from the north - the Exe? Interesting...

To today.... The rain took its sweet time arriving, and before it did I got out and didn't see much in the wind, so went to Blackball. I counted 11 GC Grebes before the visibility died, and as the front came through, at least 200 Kittiwakes came in to shelter in the lee of the cliffs. Also at least 7 Razorbill, one very close inshore, but no other grebes or any divers that I could make out. One of the 1w Kitts looked quite Sabs-like, but the visibility and my not having the Big Scope to hand meant it could only go down as a Possible. I did find a nice collybita Chiff in the undercliff, [that rhyme being one I've been waiting to use for longer than I'd care to admit..] and got all rain-spotted looking up at it.