Wednesday 5 November 2014

Another new bird

With the weather starting off dry and sunny on Monday we headed north to Voe in the hope we would see the Rose Coloured Starling that has been present for around 16 consecutive days. Arriving at the location we could see a number of common starlings visiting the fat balls along with sparrows.


After a wait of about 1/2 hour the RC starling appeared on one of the out houses. It didn't stay long before flying off, during the wait for it to reappear a  Brambling started to come to the feeders and a Sparrow with a partial white forehead head.



The Rose coloured Staling was my 14th  new bird since moving to Shetland in April.



Again the RC Starling re appeared again on the shed at the far side of the garden but it didn't make any attempt to come down to the feeder, where several people had managed good photos. It flew off again and after an hour we gave up and moved to our next location at Kirkabister.


Passing along Vidlin Voe the light was superb, with the sunlight hitting Lunna on the opposite shore. After passing several houses we parked up and set off up the hill on foot. Conditions were very wet underfoot but apart from sheep and a flock of Greylag little else was seen. Further up the hill a couple of snipe flew up and this drew my attention to three birds down on the Voe which  turned out to be two Gt Northern divers and a Slavonian Grebe, now in winter plumage.

A lock at the top held three wigeon, then a flock of 150 Golden Plover flew over. Thrushes started to appear on the hill, mostly Fieldfare mixed in with a few Redwing. Back down around the cottages Blackbird, Starling and Robin (4) could all be seen on pasture rather than in the bushes.The starlings always ready to jump up to ride on a sheep and to gain a better views.



The weather changed to cold wet and windy day for our next trip to Geosetter. The previous day a Red Flanked Bluetail had been caught and ringed and provided good views but when we went the following day it was not present. We did see Goldcrest (2) Robin, Twite (4) Blackbird (11) Redwing (6) Raven Hoodie and a couple of fly past snipe.

If you want to see landscape photos of the Kirkabister area please visit my blog at:
shetlanddream.blogspot.co.uk  - at the weekend

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