Bugger!

Is what I said upon looking at Devon Bird News this afternoon.

This post wasn't meant to start this way. I'd been working on the story of how I decided to go to Beesands - something possibly even of interest to you, my long-suffering readers - but then I see the photos of what showed up right after I left... Drat and double drat.

Getting back to where I was going to start...

I Had a Cunning Plan.

Where to go birding? Its an interesting question. You could go look for something someone else has found, look for something where you usually go, or think about weather, time of year and a multitude of other factors. How to decide? I'm not going to blather on about this much longer, my intent is merely to say that there is a rational, reasoned method to deciding where is likely to be good.

Sometimes I just throw that right out the window.

Ever tried seawatching on a blazingly sunny day with an offshore wind? {Madness.} From a beach? {Call the nice men in clean white coats.} The beach bit was new, part of a plan so cunning it could be a fox that-[[Get on with it!]] Ahem. Yes, so, yesterday I tried a 'different' tack on the off chance that a Certain Shearwater was hanging around Lyme Bay and hadn't just gone off back to where it is supposed to be. Start Bay had Gannets feeding right inshore, with more lingering offshore, and as the cliffs are a bit high and I'm not on Trinity House's Most Favoured List I gave Beesands a go.

Finding a bit with shelter, a little height and so on, I sat and stared. It very nearly paid off, too. Not the Cory's, ha ha, but I got so close to nailing a small and very nice-looking skua being blown along by the wind... A Balearic was less slippery [or, to put it another way, closer and noticed earlier], as were a few Manxies, 60-odd Gannets [passing south, as opposed to the lingering fishers]and the odd Kitt, Fulmar and auk. Two tern spp. zipped past close and north and eluded ID beyond sterna [very fast and very close] and a diver flew south, then one north [quite possibly the same one]. It was good practice in ID, if nothing else, enlivened by two good in/offs. Firstly a Grey Heron, which decided to start soaring as it got a look at how many gulls were around - it crossed the coast very high up. Secondly a Hobby, looking dark enough underneath to get me all worked up before I decided that, no it's tail just wasn't long enough for that and the jizz was all wrong too.

Then I spent a couple of hours watching the assorted Swifts, Swallows, House and Sand [3 of these, at least] Martins over the Ley. Great views, and especially of the Swifts, as I interrogated the swirling eddies of birds closely in case of a sneaky Red-rump or a Pallid. Again, good practice on the Swifts, if nothing else.

Swifts - bigger, faster, darker, noisier than Hirundines. Browner? Cute little chin patches? I see them every day that they're here - they nest right over there ::Points:: - but still never get views with such good light as I got at Beesands. Also assorted warblers and Gadwall quacklings, looking really cute....

I eventually moved on and tried Strete Gate, where a Sarnie had a fish and then I got lucky. Close in, catching a flatfish and then fending off two hungry young Cormorants - a summer plumaged Great Northern Diver. WOW. Plus more Gannets diving right close in. It was quite something earlier at Beesands, that - Gannets literally a stone's throw from the shore, with the sea and the sky and the sand. :D

There's not actually a lot else I can report. Birds getting on with breeding, no flyover kites for me, let alone storks.. I may find myself inflicting something more philosophical on you this week, to make up for it. Possibly involving Current Events [[But not involving superinjunctions. Well, except for [CENSORED], but that's hardly surprising is it, what with the stuff about the [CENSORED] and the big bucket of [CENSORED], never mind the [CENSORED], which is just wrong...]]

[[[Legal Notice.

The Backward Birder would like to apologise for the previous paragraph, and has given assurances that he will not even hint vaguely, let alone talk about [CENSORED] when he gets out of prison.]]]

Finally, despite my statement to the contrary, I have started a Work List. Don't panic, I'm still not going to inflict it on you.

I haven't got Chaffinch yet, for one thing.

;)