York Bird Club weekend trip to Fife, Last day.

Apart from a brief spell of early sunshine it was dull and overcast today, we started with a look from behind the Hotel again, a Purple Sandpiper was showing on the rocks there this morning, then we headed to an area half way between Largo and Ruddens Point where we hoped to get closer views of the Surf Scoter if it was in the same area as yesterday, we couldn’t find it today though and in fact there seemed to be fewer birds in the bay altogether. Next up was Tentsmuir Forest north of St Andrews which is the release site of the White Tailed Eagles, a vast area with some impressive dunes between the forest and the sea but no Eagles were seen while we were there. Early afternoon we made our way over to Loch Leven and visited the RSPB Vane Farm reserve, it looked an impressive reserve but after recent earthworks there was nothing much in front of the hides apart from a couple of Buzzards perched on posts, there was a good number of Whooper Swans and Pinkfeet on the edge of the Loch however as well as a wide range of Ducks and further out we added Goosander and Great Northern Diver to the trip list, then with the prospect of a long drive back we packed up mid afternoon and headed for home, again it had been a very enjoyable weekend and I look forward to next years, collectively we saw around 115 species over the three days and I personally saw 95 including a new sub-species.

Lower Largo in early morning sunshine

Tentsmuir forest and dunes

Pinkfeet over Loch Leven

Loch Leven scenics