Monday 6 May 2019

6th May 2019 Unst N4 Occasional hail showers

Having made the trek out west to Flubersgerdie on three out of the last five days hoping to benefit from it being peak passage time for White-billed Divers, but without any success, I decided to take it easy this morning. A female Blackcap was briefly in our rosa and with binoculars in hand I scanned the wick from our kitchen window. I could see a large Diver sat on the sea so decided to brave the elements and scope it. As expected, it was a Great Northern Diver, I scanned to the east and soon saw another Great Northern Diver, I continued scanning and there was a superb summer-plumaged adult White-billed Diver - stunning! It spent most of its time closer to Lamba Ness, so rather distant from here, but I'm not complaining! On moving-up here, Mark Chapman told me that it was only a matter of time before I would find a White-billed Diver from our kitchen window by just keep checking 'our' voe - it took just a few days over 3 years! Robbie was delighted with it being an Unst tick for him after 10 years of waiting. 

White-billed Diver off Millfield
The fifth White-billed Diver I've found on Unst with the other Spring birds being on 28/4, 30/4 & 5/5.