Saturday 17 October 2015

Scilly day 16 - Tresco - Hudsonian Whimbrel

Whilst I'd had distant views of the Hudsonian Whimbrel at Gimble Porth the the previous day, it was clear it was giving much closer views than the one I'd seen at Pgham harbour erlier in the year. The aim for the day was consequently a no brainer and it was Tresco next stop.....

The boatmen keep the needs of birders in mind and one boat was unloading at Old Grimsby saving a 2 mile + walk (phew) :-) It was only a five minute walk and I was there with the boatload of birders. The Whimbrel was soon on show after hunkering down -  a local Peregrine was on patrol!

There you go!


And eventually marching out in full view in the brilliant light!






Feasting furiously on sand flies....






And every now and then ejecting the non-nutritious sandy bits!


The lack of white rump is key and it took a while but eventually I got a wing flap!


And even a flight down to the waters edge.... The wing motion blur is due to me stopping down to 100 ISO for crisper images and losing shutter speed! Grrrrrr.




 Just what I wanted.....


Touchdown!


I've still got loads of images to sort through but I'll be surprised if there's anything other than duplicates!