With rainy weather and brisk southerlies forecast I nevertheless headed out to survey another 5-kilometre stretch of the Bjäre coast this morning. The weather did not disappoint and I got very wet but there were some good birds to be had, although there were even fewer waterfowl about to count than yesterday. The survey returns were as follows; grey heron (1), cormorant (69), mute swan (8), mallard (61), wigeon (29), teal (12), eider (43) and goosander (2). So not much! Waders were likewise in short supply with totals of; snipe (4), greenshank (1), knot (1), dunlin (4) and common sandpiper (2).
Otherwise things were more exciting than I was expecting. On the way north I picked up a superb female 1K goshawk and a single Arctic skua. The real excitement though came on the heinous trudge back against the wind and rain, when I arrived back at Påarps Mal to find two more skuas close in. Both flew a short way out and landed on the sea and although one was another Arctic, the other was a 1K long-tailed! Had reasonable views of it flying around and on the sea, nice one. Do I now have to add strong southerlies with lots of rain to my autumn sea-watching calendar?
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