Filey seawatch, 29th November 2017

A quick one from this afternoon... I've been away for a few days giving talks in the interior, and made it back home to the coast for lunchtime - and thus dumped the gear, quickly fed, donned the thermals and slid down the muddy cliff to the Brigg hide for a seawatch in promisingly strong northerlies, wintry showers and plunging temperatures. As it turned out, there wasn't a great deal on the move, but the inherent wildness and solitude of the Brigg on days like this are more than enough justification.....

.... and both Common Scoter and (the only) Little Auk played nicely for the shaking camera against the tempestuous backdrop.

Round Two - Filey seawatch, 13th Nov 2017

juvenile Glaucous Gull

Another day, another highly enjoyable seawatch on the Brigg, with a moderate NW and early wintry showers calming and clearing later. Again, no great numbers and nothing rare, but a good selection of classic late autumn species and a pleasure to be there for four hours with barely another sign of humanity....

Common Scoters over the Brigg

Trek count - see here for the site

Grey Heron

Red-breasted Merganser

Black-throated Diver

Sparrowhawk - I watched this bird coming in off high from the north-east before circling the Brigg, getting harassed by gulls and then leaving back over the sea, SE towards Flamborough

Filey seawatch - 12th November 2017

Just back (happily in one piece - it was a particularly eventful climb back up the cliff in these challenging conditions) from a six-hour seawatch, with the promising scenario of gale force northerlies, raging seas, an airflow from the Arctic and the time free to relish it. As it turned out, it was high on aesthetic drama but low on birds (at least regarding abundance), with no big numbers on the move as one would wish for in such circumstances; there were, however, some enjoyable highlights, and it was a day very well spent in the company of the birds and the birds alone.

Little Auks are a classic quarry in such conditions, and happily, 14 made the notebook by the end of the day; slightly less happily (at least for the bird involved), one was the more literal quarry of a now well-fed Great Black-backed Gull (see below). Two classic hoped-for species had the good grace to bullet through at close-range through the white horses - a Leach's Storm-petrel mid-morning and a Grey Phalarope an hour or so later. Other notables included a Great Northern Diver close in the bay and nine duck species including a female Long-tailed.

IBOC 2017 - family album

Just back from the States, where we were proudly representing Filey and Flamborough Bird Observatories at the International Bird Observatory Conference 2017 (IBOC2017) in Cape May, New Jersey. I'll be writing about it in more detail within several upcoming articles, but with so much to process and build upon after what was an extraordinarily inspiring time (and so much else to do now we're back), it seems smart to kick out a succession of posts here just to keep the plates spinning.

(Thanks Bjorn for the above photo of the team vismigging at Higbees at sunrise!)

We forged great friendships (and strengthened existent ones) with comrades from all over the world, learned so much, found inspiration at every turn and above all felt very much part of a global Obs community - from which there will be many partnerships and positives to follow. So with apologies for lack of detail (for now) and photo indulgence (it's good to have them in one place and accessible beyond social media), here's a few photos that reflect the camaraderie and team spirit of the conference, its fantastic people and of the greater Cape May Bird Obs family:

(and thanks to Bjorn, Am and Maina for other photos above)

More to follow!