Incidental Birding

Tuesday November 9
Waking to near gale force wind lashing rain against the window, we aborted the planned birding day with Aileen and Bridget, opting for lunch at Cley NWT cafe instead. The splendid panoramic view from there added Avocet and Gannet to our month list. A cloud of Golden Plover rose from the Eye Field - far too distant to distinguish the American Golden amongst them.

Wednesday November 10
After a phone discussion with the Walmsley Sanctuary warden last night, my long awaited trip to Cornwall was cancelled, no sign of the American Bittern since Saturday. So disappointing but not unexpected - it's been there 6 days after 4 days at Zennen. It's taken that long to get Pam to find two clear days in which to travel. Frustrating.......
Late morning, we made a trip to the Harnser to get the menus for Christmas dinner with Mags and Anne in mid December. Good sunshine between the black clouds encouraged a trip to Winterton Beach. We stayed 45 minutes seeing few birds but the ones we saw were good. Five female Common Scoter close inshore, 25 Eider including two bright males flew through and two Red-throated Divers fished amongst the troughs and rollers remaining  from yesterday.
The highlight for me was at least two Little Auks heading west, always a delight. Unidentified Auks scurrying through, much further out, as were the Gannets.
Scratby produced a Skua sp, very distantly flying and then ditching, probably a Bonxie. That's the problem with sea-watching from the east coast, birds are seldom close in.