A touch of Snow! (27th October)

Another day on patch starting at Swanpool where I was very surprised to come across 2 PINTAIL dabbling only feet from where I was was stood at the northern end of the lagoon!  This is a fairly scarce duck for the area and behaving so unusually really baffled me.  Thankfully a couple other local patchers managed to jam in on them shortly afterwards.

both of the female/immature Pintail

A Sandwich Tern was also flying over Swanpool car park and I later moved on to Pennance Point for a short sea-watch.  On arriving at my favourite sea-watching spot, I was rather disappointing to see it was already occupied by a couple of teenagers so I gave them some space and wondered down the side of the cliff to find another spot.  I'd just sat down when I noticed out of the corner of my eye a small bird flit out on top of a rock.  Raising my bins, I could hardly believe what I was looking at.  A stunning male SNOW BUNTING!  He was an absolute beauty and the thought of sea-watching was suddenly abandoned as I remained watching it for the rest of the day.  Three other lucky patchers managed to connect with it as the day progressed and it afforded reasonable views.  Easily one of the best patch birds to have turned up this year!

1st win. male Snow Bunting!

A couple other bits and bobs from the day included 3 Rock Pipits, 3 Turnstone and an adult Mediterranean Gull.