A Quiet Sea

The winds looked good for a seawatch today so me and Andy headed off to Flamborough, sounded good when we first arrived as there had already been an adult Sabine's Gull and some Long Tailed Skua's through but the rest of the day proved hard work with just Gannets and Fulmars passing in any numbers, we did manage a few Manx and a single Sooty Shearwater though plus several Arctic and Great Skua's, a female Redstart in the Foghorn Station garden offered a brief distraction.

a clump of Fleabane proved popular with some butterflies

Small Copper

Peacock

and Wall Brown

Interesting Insects

Nothing much birdwise this past week but I've had some good Moths in and around the House and Garden.

Large Yellow Underwing

Silver Y

Amblyptilia acanthadactyla

Riband Wave

Garden Carpet

Gold Spot

and at Redhouse Reservoir mid week there were a good few Dragonflies about

Common Blue Damselfly

Southern Hawker

Migrant Hawker

plus this Silver Ground Carpet Moth

there were also a few Brown Hawkers but they didn't pose.

Hits and Misses but no Posers

I nipped to Blacktoft Sands after work last Thursday afternoon but there was nothing much doing even the young Marsh Harriers weren't up to much, still a dozen or more Spotted Redshanks amongst the Waders though.

Looking over the Reedbed to Yorkshire

some of the Spot Shanks

This morning me and Mark headed up to South Shields hoping to photograph the Terns that have been posing on the beach there recently, it was a lovely sunny morning but unfortunately the Terns were busy fishing, we gave it a couple of hours and managed to find one or two Roseate's but they didn’t land on the beach and even the few Common and Sandwich that did were wary and didn’t allow a close approach. We then moved back down the coast a bit to Whitburn Steel where a Bonaparte's Gull had turned up a couple of days ago, unfortunately the tide was right out and it was a needle in a haystack job we scanned through the Gulls we could see for an hour or so but failed to locate it nor had any of the other birders there, we gave up on it and headed south just as the first shower started although it eased off as we arrived at Saltholme, we had lunch and checked out the Saltholme and Dormans Pools, there were several Little Gulls flying about but no sign of the juv Black Tern this afternoon, there were a few Waders out in front of the Phil Stead Hide but none came close so we decided to move on and check out the Lockwood Beck Reservoir for Osprey. Once again we drove through a pretty hefty shower en route but it had passed over by the time we reached the Reservoir, a quick scan soon found the bird was present and flying along the trees at the far end, it settled in one so we headed off to get a bit closer unfortunately (I use this word far too often) it decided it had had enough and buggered off to wherever else it goes before we got close.

juv Common

Roseate

Common

juv Common

Good fishing

Sandwich

Osprey sat on its tree

Leaving