Always The Chance.

With the tail end of Ophelia still lashing through yesterday, it was never going to be a good idea to walk along the headland at Cockersand, but it might have been a better one to stake out for a couple of hours sheltered from the howler in the motor and see if the odd sea-bird was going to be blown off course and pushed by me.

Well it might have been a good idea, but it bore no fruit, but as the tide fell the waders dropped in to feed on the exposed shore. Nothing remarkable, but descending in number, Dunlin, Redshank, Ringed Plover, Turnstone, 3 Bar-tailed Godwit, 2 Grey Plover, with 3 Eider off Plover Scar. In a field by Abbey Farm, c.350 Golden Plover and 25 Black-tailed Godwit were seeking refuge from the high tide and wind, and 15 Linnet were around the cover crop on Slack Lane. 

The Lune Estuary at Glasson was off the boil, but it's always good to find a Mediterranean Gull, with 2 Great-crested Grebe, seen as a scarce resident breeder at only four known local locations last year, with offshore numbers declined, seeming to have recently taken a liking to the estuary at Glasson with four seen last Monday.

On Conder Pool, 14 Little Grebe counted, a Common Sandpiper, 2 Goosander eclipse drake, and the lone Pink-footed Goose.

Cormorant. Jan Larsson @ Vingspann  

I watched 2 Cormorant fishing on Conder Pool yesterday, I timed them on three feeding sessions, they both dived up to 10 times in 60 seconds, taking small fry like there was no tomorrow, which is excactly what the Little Grebe are capable of doing here.

Wednesday 18 October, a beautiful sunny morning....The calm after the storm.