Biiiirding In The Rain. Pt. 1, A Soggy Patch

Oh dear. Oh dearie dearie dear.
Right, this is an ever-increasingly long term summary of my varied amblings about the Patch. I need to get this posted before it stretches into December..



While the east winds persisted, the weather remembered how to rain and things are all a bit muddy.


Just because water was falling out of the sky didn't stop me from prowling about the Patch, though, with... Well, it could hardly get worse, could it?


And on the plus side for you, the rain played merry havoc with my deranged autofocus [I am never buying a camera that can't be focused manually again, btw, NEVER.], so there will be fewer pictures for you to tear your weeping eyeballs from.

Right, so.. I did, unsurprisingly, not find anything amazing. It was all usual suspects and not even a hint of that Blackstart to miss with the camera.

"Ho Ho Ho.

Now gimme a mince pie or I'll have you!"

Time for something rarely pictured on here;

Genetically Italian

Ahem.

So, to summarise, I've been checking what sheltered bits of inshore habitat I can find, interspersed with attempts to stay upright while looking for cowering sheltering birds on the sea. Coverage has been reasonable for me over a working week, with 4 out of 6 days, though I haven't had time to visit everywhere every time.

Let's just put a few photos up, shall we?

Woodpigs!

Flocks totalling >350 on Sunday, though I missed a thousand plus group*, which looked like Starlings, they were so densely packed. Drat.

Kittiwakes.

The only seabirds about [Gannets excluded]

despite up to F10 onshore winds

Common Gulls 

Gotta love 'em

Blobs! Scoter!

Two groups around the buoy farm,
 totalling about 80,

though never in one shot at once

Buzzard

More sand on Oddicombe

Compare to this shot from a week earlier.

Yeah, reduced to sand level photos.. What am I coming to?

Worse to come! Yesterday, after said F10 southerly, I once again had a go at the Blackball roost, getting 1350+ large gulls, ~370 Kittiwakes, and ~60 BHG, plus at least 5 Common Gulls. Of perhaps more interest, the first four GC Grebes of the winter.

Blobs!

Gull roost density

Kittiwakes

[mostly]

Four GC Grebes

Be Seeing You...



[[*My razor-eyed Dad didn't.]]