4 December 2022 - Redcar & Scarborough
« Newer | Older »King Eider, Little Auk, Long-tailed Duck, Little Gull, Purple Sandpipers, Mediterranean Gulls
An excellent day out with Andrew to Redcar and Scarborough, targeting King Eider mainly. We almost didn't go because the weather was looking pretty bad, but decided to chance it, and it worked out really well. It was perishingly cold, with a very strong NE wind and frequent rain showers. We arrived at Redcar just after 8am, and started scanning through the rafts of Common Scoter and Eider, searching for King Eider (or Velvet Scoter). The sea had a huge swell and it was difficult to see any birds for more than a few seconds before they dipped behind a wave again, or dived. Andrew found a female Long-tailed Duck quite close inshore, and we continued to search for the King Eider among several rafts of Eider as we moved along into Redcar town, finding sheltered spots to view from. After about three hours, I spotted it in flight (I wasn't 100% sure at the time, but realised afterwards that was the bird), but it landed and promptly disappeared. Not long after, Andrew picked the bird up with a small group of Eider, slightly closer than the main group, and I was lucky to get onto it straight away. You could see the blue on the head and the mainly black rear end with white patches, though viewing wasn't great. We watched it intermittently for a couple of minutes as it bobbed behind the waves and reappeared, and then just as quickly, we lost sight of it and couldn't relocate it.
Happy that we'd at least found it after nearly four hours of searching, we headed back to the car. We'd been watching Turnstones on the sea wall just in front of us, and several came onto the path a few feet away, so I managed to spend some time photographing those, and just before we left, we looked over the sea wall to find a group of 8 or so Purple Sandpipers with the Turnstones. At one point I'd picked up a juvenile Little Gull, but couldn't get Andrew onto it, and other birds included Sanderling and a single Bar-tailed Godwit.
We decided to head for Scarborough where there'd been some Waxwings the previous day, though there were no reports from today. It rained pretty much the whole way, and when we arrived there was no sign of any Waxwings (or people looking for them). We had a good look round the area trying to find suitable locations, but without any luck, so decided to head for Scarborough harbour in case anything had been blown in.
At Scarborough harbour it seemed even more dull and overcast, but we headed out nonetheless. The harbour itself was fairly quiet apart from a Guillemot, so we walked round to the harbour mouth. On the sea was a Razorbill, and then we both simultaneously spotted a Little Auk just off the harbour mouth sea wall. Unfortunately it immediately flew out to the bay and was lost to view. We got our scopes out to try and relocate it, and once we had, it again flew, but this time came towards us. It kept coming closer, until it was almost under our noses, and we managed some great views before it dived and we lost view of it. Thinking it had gone back to the harbour wall area, we headed round there and were suddenly soaked by a giant wave breaking over the sea wall, landing right on top of us! However, we were happy with our lot, and to finish the day, managed a couple of Mediterranean Gulls around the harbour area.
Turnstone, 1/500 sec, f/7.1, 500 mm, ISO 1000 (view full size image)
Turnstone, 1/500 sec, f/7.1, 500 mm, ISO 2000 (view full size image)
Purple Sandpipers, 1/500 sec, f/7.1, 500 mm, ISO 1600 (view full size image)
Purple Sandpiper, 1/500 sec, f/7.1, 500 mm, ISO 2000 (view full size image)
Little Auk, 1/500 sec, f/7.1, 500 mm, ISO 10000 (view full size image)
Little Auk, 1/640 sec, f/7.1, 500 mm, ISO 12800