16th August

More rain at dawn cleared though after an hour or so to leave a great autumnal feeling morning – a bit murky with a light easterly breeze and birds flying around all over the place; the nets were a waste of time despite the good conditions as is the norm at the moment but there were waterbirds and waders everywhere with the highlight being a juvenile Little Gull feeding for a while just offshore – the first of the autumn.   Wader totals around Vågsvollvåien included 43 Golden Plover, 16 Lapwings, 6 Ruff, at least 65 Snipe (flocks were whizzing around everywhere, the total was probably double this!), single Whimbrel and Spotted Redshank, 6 Greenshank, 5 Wood Sandpipers and 6 Common Sandpipers.   A juvenile Goldeneye was also noteworthy on here.

                There was some movement offshore with small wader flocks heading south including 98 Oystercatchers, 8 Ruff and 48 Redshank with smaller numbers of Dunlin, Knot and Turnstone while150 Greylag Geese also went south; the fields were also busy with a flock of 42+ Ruff over at Vågsvoll easily the largest I’ve seen here along with more Golden Plover and Curlew with everything getting spooked every so often by at least 4 Peregrines with one belting out to sea and neatly plucking a Redshank from a migrating flock a few hundred metres offshore – impressive stuff!

                Headed off round the coast late morning where there were also good numbers of waders such as 55 Knot, 120 Dunlin, 9 Bar-tailed Godwits, 11 Turnstone, another Spotted Redshank and 105 Redshank along with the usual double figure counts of the other Tringa’s while there were also increases to 72+ Teal and 9 Wigeon and more Greylag Geese went south producing a day total of 640.

                Inland was much quieter with a Green Woodpecker, 2 Tree Pipits, 3 Yellow Wagtails, 4 Red-backed Shrikes, 4 Sparrowhawks and most noteworthy a group of 12 Whinchats at Vågsvollmarka before a look at Vågsvollvika produced 2 juvenile Little Stints with another 118+ Dunlin.   I was crouched down in the rocks at the water’s edge trying to photograph the waders which were only three metres away when a Peregrine travelling at supersonic speeds shot over my shoulder (I could hear the wind over its wings) and tore into the flock three metres away, I don’t really know how it missed everything but I think it clipped a Ruff forcing it and a couple of Dunlin to crash into the water right in front of me – absolutely incredible!

 

Bar-tailed Godwits

Knot

This Turnstone seemed to enjoy winding up the Starlings and then ignoring them as they frequently squared up to him!

Spotted Redshank zooming in

Common Sandpiper

Adult and juvenile Ringed Plover

Scanned through hundreds of Dunlin today but couldn't find any rares!

This was seconds before the Peregrine came in a clipped this Ruff, my camera was all set wrong to get any kind of  picture of the event - not that I had any chance of reacting fast enough anyway!