Death Chemical.

Still no birding for me since last Friday I'm afraid, so a little politics/conservation to fill the gap once again.

Guillemot Arkive 

There's some excellent news that the discharge of high-viscosity polyisobutylene (PIB) from ships during tank cleaning operations is to be banned. The classification of high-viscosity PIB's is to be changed to require full tank pre-wash and disposal of all residues at port and prohibit any discharge at sea. PIB was the chemical responsible for the deaths of over 4,000 seabirds on the south-west coast earlier this year, and thousands of people were shocked to hear about the worst marine pollution incident since the Torrey Canyon in the spring of 1967 when this was the worlds worst oil spill, and to date remains the UK's worst.

Of the 4,000 seabirds between February and April this year, most of the 18 species involved were Guillemot washed up on beaches from Cornwall to Dorset, most were dead, but some were alive and taken into care. The same substance of PIB was responsible for the deaths of hundreds of seabirds off the Dutch coast in 2010. 

And now for something much lighter and much more colourful, though they're both 'black'....

Black-eared Wheatear Ana Minguez 

The Black-eared Wheatear forms a species pair with the Pied Wheatear, and some individuals are inseparable. In spite of the fact that it breeds as close to Britain as southern France the Black-eared Wheatear is surprisingly rare here. A brilliant image of this bird....Thank You Ana. 

Black Redstart Noushka Dufort

A passage migrant and summer breeder, the Black Redstart was added to the British List when it was first recorded near London in 1829. Thanks for the excellent image of these youngsters Noushka. Photography at its best, as every one posted on Birds2blog testifies, you only have to 'clik the pik' to see why....But none of 'em are ever mine!

A Pallid Swift or Common Swift reported Wednesday from the Public Hide at Leighton Moss RSPB Reserve at 1.40pm. Thanks to the RBA pager service for this information.  

I'D SOONER BE BIRDING!....Birding....what's birding!