Wheatear

I had a go at Seawatching this week under the expert guidance of  David Campbell and Nick Bond,  and much to my surprise, once you get to grips with a few of the basic identification skills, it can get quite interesting.

We had a good list on Tuesday morning. The experts logged 689 birds with 27 species although my count was a bit below that total. I could identify most of the birds with Great and Arctic Skuas being particularly pleasing but a series of distant dots remained just that, distant dots rather than the Manx Shearwaters that the others could identify. The only downside is that seawatching gives very few picture opportunities.

I was expecting a repeat on Wednesday morning but with no breeze there was very little moving. Fortunately a Wheatear on the beach did at least give me a chance to use the camera and also a few Photoshop skills to correct the early morning colour cast. My first Wheatear of the year so worth recording.

I managed to see the Savi's Warbler at West Rise Marsh last week although only for a few seconds at a time. It was great to see but there was no chance of a record shot and my key UK list of seen but not photographed now rises to 11 with Warblers responsible for the bulk of that list.

Consolation was this Sedge Warbler singing from the scrub, another first for the year.