In case you were wondering if I
have given up on Rathlin for the year. No not a bit of it. Unfortunately the weather has been against me
and I have not made it over as much as I would have liked. Nevertheless, I have made a couple of trips
since my last update.
19 October
A common feature of late autumn
birding on Rathlin are the hoards of Kittiwakes which can be seen dip feeding
in the sound, particularly following westerly gales. This morning saw over 1000 birds bobbing
above the waves. Another is the
frustrating ferry times at weekends, which result in only being able to bird
for about 4 hours during a ‘day’ trip.
Covering the north half of the patch today produced very little – a Whimbrel
at the West Pier, 1 or 2 Common Redpolls
with 30 Lesser Redpolls in Church Valley and good numbers of other finches
which have now attracted at least 3 Sparrowhawks (including a very large female
mentioned in a previous post) to the patch.
Also of note were 15 Goldcrests and an obvious arrival of Chaffinches,
with over 50 birds scattered around the patch.
3 November
Perhaps the most unusual sighting
of the whole autumn was of three other birders joining me on the ferry
today! Wilton Farrelly, Ian Graham and
Philip West picked a good day to come over, as this was the roughest ferry
crossing I have experienced to the island!
It turns out the next sailing was cancelled, so we were lucky enough to
even get to the island.
Once safely on dry land the lads
covered the East Light and gardens area and I went off to check the southern
half of the patch. I was glad to find
Ballycarry Pool holding water and attracting a few birds again, including 28
Teal and 17 Curlew. The hedge here had numerous Blackbirds, a Redwing and a
Goldcrest. Several Meadow Pipits were feeding along the edge of the pool.
I worked my way down to the South
Light seeing very little of note, so I began making my way back towards Church
Bay to check some gardens. I then
received news of a Brambling feeding along the shore in Church Bay;
this would be an island tick – so needless to say I got there fairly
quickly! Initially there was no further
sign of the bird, but it was eventually picked up again at its original
location, when it was discovered there were actually 2 of them. Species number 120 for the year and my 138th
for the patch! Cheers lads.
 |
| Patch tick Brambling |
Whilst on the ferry back to Ballycastle,
Wilton filled me in on the rest of their sightings from up East – 2 Snow Buntings, Blackcap, Merlin, c16
Goldcrests and numerous Goldfinches. It
then transpired that they had also seen a couple of proper patch rarities, a Woodpigeon and 8 Long-tailed Tits! I’ll need
written descriptions for those two...
From talking to a few islanders
today it appears there has been somewhat of an influx of Snow Buntings to the
island this past couple of weeks, with single birds being seen in gardens, ones
and twos in the Ushet Lough area and a small flock currently at Kebble at the
west end of the island.
This late in the year my chances
of seeing additional species are becoming slim, but I won’t be giving up just
yet.
Score now 120 species, 150 points
or 118.11%
