Blown Away

Very nearly and more than once today at Hope's Nose!

Yowzer, but the weather meant business... Sea watching involved quite a bit of watching the sea, and what a show! The waves were putting water [not spray, proper white water] halfway up the Ore Stone and right over the Lead Stone, there was the proper 'boiling' spray coming off the waves [and the rocks], vicious little squalls, microbursts, and the odd 'sea devil' too.


Wow.


The wind was in that nasty mood where it swung between SSE and SSW and made The Steps and The Traditional Seawatching Spot unusable. Even The Last Resort was taking gusts, so I wedged into the north end of The Traverse Of The Gods [right next to TTSS], where I was very sheltered if not very comfortable, perched on a narrow rock step. Unfortunately, being right up against the rock meant I couldn't deploy the great big bumbleshoot without being bent over double by it - and so not being able to see anything on the sea. Minor technical problem, there. If I'd been psychic enough I'd have brought my broken one, which would have worked pretty well and kept me dry, but alas I wasn't and didn't. So, I got very very soggy as the water gradually found all the weak spots in my waterproofing..


So what did I see for my four hours of cold and wet and not quite miserableness?

A couple of divers were in Hope Cove; a BTD was lurking close in to the cliffs and a GND started further out and then came right close in to the Toe - at one point it was less than 10' offshore! Crippling! :) Early on at least 2 Harbour Porpoises were in the lee of the Lead Stone [and even seeing the 'at least 2' was pretty jammy, with the waves] and late on a Grey Seal was right where the GND had been an hour or so earlier :)

The SWBCM was in full flow, and had attendants all the time I was there; I counted maxima of 292 Kittiwake, 26 Fulmar, 23 BHG, 5 Common Gull, and 3 LBB - plus Herrings and GBBs. A couple of Bonxies showed up to see what the fuss was about, but didn't come in close. They both plonked down on the sea just before a squall arrived and had gone when the viewing cleared. A juvenile C Scoter - just the one - came haring through, with a trickle of Gannets, Kitts, Fulmars and auks also passing. Clickers really not needed!

I was reminded, though, that seawatching is not just about counting passage - and not just because there wasn't much! - as the Kitts in particular put on a marvellous display of aeronautical skill. Also on show were some shore birds - the american term appropriate here - with 5 Purple Sands and 2 Turnstone messing about on the rocks below me the whole time I was there. One of the Turnstones decided to have a fly, lifted up maybe 15' and set off north at high speed. Backwards. The rest stayed lower, dodging gouts of water, trying not to get blown off their feet, and taking frequent baths in the rainwater pools.

The Rockits, as on Saturday, were soon playing the sidle up game. I was in the territory of a rather olivey one, very white below, too [the variation in Rockits is quite interesting] and it got to play 'how close will it come?'. The answer to that being 'right up to my foot, after a few aborted tries, with a defiant chirp as it snatched the little chunk of sarnie and scurried off with it'.

Finally, the Patch wouldn't be the Patch without a dodgy gull, and I eventually saw one; a manky-looking 1w that after a hard bit of studying I decided was one of those annoying LBBxHerrings.

So, no Little Auks, no white wings, not even that Balearic [by the sound of it, it probably passed the Nose before it got light! ;) ], as for a Puffin? [Oh, you know it's coming] Nuffin.


I had been planning to try to outbeast the weather and maybe get some passage in the lull in the wind that had been forecast for the afternoon, but the weather won. Four hours in and I was cold and wet and out of coffee, with the wind if anything getting stronger. I admitted defeat and, not fancying making The Traverse into the teeth of the storm, I got out via The Wall, which was more like The Waterfall. Not fun. The wind nearly got me twice more and the rain was hitting as hard as hail, which isn't a joyride, either, but I got to the bushes and then the Rock Path was comparatively easy. That last says it all, really!

As I type now, almost 5 hours later, the wind hasn't shown a sign of letting up, so at least I made the right call. Not the sane call, which would have been to stay in bed - or at least limit myself to getting wet twitching The Artist's Cattle Egret [now that's a nice Garden Tick! ;) ] - but then birding has very little to do with sanity, now does it?
If you don't look, you don't see.