Surf Scoter had eluded me twice in 2019 already despite it only being a few days in and the Barry Buddon Shorelark hadn't even been attempted owing to time restraints on the 1st. However, both species were available elsewhere within relatively easy travelling distance and with other decent birds also around in that area I felt it was worth a trip to Lothian. I arranged to meet up with Roy for a day out birding, meeting at Edinburgh Gateway station at 0850.
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| Waxwing |
I headed out at 0705 to walk to the railway station for the train around 0740. As it was still around 90 minutes before sunrise birds were few and far between but I did still manage to see Blackbird, Robin and Herring Gull. Carrion Crow, Magpie and Mallard were seen around Dalmeny station a few minutes before I got off the train to meet Roy. There was no sign of him where we had agreed to meet though he'd messaged to say he'd arrived early. I went looking for him and luckily spotted him just about to drive off to look for me. Luckily I caught his eye before he'd travelled too far back towards where I'd just been.
Pied Wagtail and Jackdaw were seen around the car park and once we set off to pick up another birder, Carolyn Hargest who I knew of through Twitter, we added Woodpigeon and Buzzard. We headed first to Kilspindie to try and see the pair of Shorelarks that have been around there for a while which had been seen the previous day by the golf course car park. We parked up and scanned around for the birds. Out on the estuary we could see plenty of birds - Oystercatchers, a Lapwing, Curlews, Dunlin, Redshank, Wigeon, Teal, Shelduck, Mallard and Eider. A Great Black Backed Gull flew past and Roy found a
Little Egret among the rocks further on which flew past us shortly after. Around the nearby feeders we saw Tree Sparrows, Chaffinch, Greenfinch and Goldfinch. No Shorelarks though so we decided to try Plan B for Shorelarks.
This involved a bit more walking from the car. John Muir Country Park was a place I'd never been on any of my previous visits to Lothian so I was interested to see what it was like. A Coal Tit was seen as we headed back to the main road and a Kestrel and a Mistle Thrush were seen on the relatively short drive. A Cormorant flew over as we neared the park. We found the Pay and Display machine at the car park was being fixed and the man fixing it said thre wasn't another machine and we wouldn't be able to get a ticket until he'd fixed the one he was working on, though he wouldn't give any indication how long he was going to be. I took a photo as proof that we weren't just avoiding paying.
The park was quite busy though thankfully the particular part we were headed for looked relatively quiet of walkers (with and without dogs). A Meadow Pipit was flushed as we walked out across the wide flat area between the dunes. Starlings flew around. A couple of Redshanks caught my eye among the grass and when I stopped to photograph them an unseen flock of
Twite took to the air and circled round before dropping back down relatively nearby. Another nice year-tick for me. More movement caught my eye a little further on - a large flock of Skylarks feeding on the ground unconcerned by our close proximity. Scanning out to the river we then added Bar Tailed Godwit, Grey Plover, Ringed Plover, Redshank and Dunlin. Red Breasted Merganser and an Eider were seen on the river. We found the area where the Shorelarks had apparently been seen but couldn't find them. A small flock of
Linnets (and Greenfich) put in an appearance giving me another year-tick.
We headed back to the car not quite empty-handed but disappointed at not finding Shorelarks there either. Arriving back at the car park we found a traffic warden type attendant dishing out parking tickets and explained to him about the guy fixing the machine. He told us there was actually another machine which we could have used which none of us knew about and the guy hadn't mentioned. He then tried to say we should have downloaded an app to pay for the ticket - making the assumption that we had space on our phones and an internet connection to be able to do so. I showed him the photo of the guy at the machine but he was still adamant that we were at fault. However there was no ticket on Roy's car and he said we were 'on countdown' so it appears (touch wood!) that we escaped an unjust punishment for something that clearly wasn't our fault.
There were Waxwings nearby at West Barns so we went looking for them, adding a Grey Heron on the way, and found them in a tree at the corner of the street. Collared Dove and Blue Tit were also seen and a family group of Mute Swans were seen flying past. A few Feral Pigeons were around also. We debated heading inland to try for Arctic and Mealy Redpoll around Whiteadder and Hopes Reservoirs which had been seen with a flock of Lessers. However we decided that our chances of success were better making another quick attempt at Kilspindie and then heading to Musselburgh to try and see Surf Scoter and maybe Black Necked or Red Necked Grebe.
Ther were a few more birders around at Kilspindie and we discovered the birds had just flown onto the fairway at the golf course. I was able to see 2 very small brown blobs and then caught the 2
Shorelarks in flight as they flew back to near the car park. Neil MacIver managed to spot them shuffling around at the edge of the salt marsh though they would disappear into small ditches and were hard to follow. A Peregrine flew over us having caused chaos over by the bridge at Aberlady. We did all get reasonable views eventually. I skirted round a bit to try to photograph the birds coming towards me. Despite going much further than I thought the birds would have, the birds spotted me and flew off again. I apologised to everyone for flushing them though as we'd all seen them no-one was overly bothered (thankfully - sorry again, folks!).
There was some debate as to where to park for the best chance at Surf Scoter and the Grebes. I was able to tell them that we should easily be able to do both, if we parked at the small car park Ian had used a few months ago, from where we could walk to the seawall to check the river at the western end of the lagoons, and then drive round to the river mouth to scan for the Surf Scoter. Reaching the seawall we scanned out over the water. Things were relatively quiet though there were a number of Goldeneye to be seen. A few Black Headed Gulls flew past. Shag was seen on the water further out. We managed to find a couple of Grebes near the ducks and (slightly) disappointingly for me discovered they were Black Necked, rather than the more common Slavonian, which I hadn't seen this year yet. However, I made the most of the opportunity to get photos a bit closer than the Elie bird seems to approach.
A few Velvet Scoters were seen further out as well as some Eider before we drove round to the river mouth. there were lots of gulls (Herring, Black Headed and Common as far as I could tell) at the mouth with Goldeneye and Wigeon on the river. It had got a bit gloomier and the light was far from ideal (a recurring theme when looking for Surfies, it seems) but we scanned towards Edinburgh to no avail. We moved a little further around and thankfully Carolyn managed to somehow find the
Surf Scoter all on its own quite distantly out on the river. I was able to see the bird through Carolyn's scope - nigh on impossible using my small Opticron one. Long Tailed Duck was also seen and Carolyn had a Great Crested Grebe that I was unable to find through her scope. A Turnstone was roosting with Oystercatchers . We had a brief look for Short Eared Owl but drew a blank then headed for the car and homewards, stopping to add one final year tick -
Canada Geese, on the Esk.
A decent enough day out though with not quite enough time to try for all the birds I'd hoped to see (Water Rail, Nuthatch etc) though we did also have good views of birds I'd seen already but Roy and Carolyn hadn't, so overall it worked out quite well for all 3 of us. I managed to see 6 new year-ticks (in bold) among the 57 species seen.
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| Shelduck & Oystercatcher |
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| lapwing, Oystercatcher, Dunlin, Teal & Shelduck |
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| Greenfinch |
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| Little Egret |
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| Yellowhammer |
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| Skylark |
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| Redshank & Twite |
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| Twite |
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| Twite |
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| Bar Tailed Godwit, Oystercatcher, Dunlin, Redshank & Grey Plover |
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| Linnet & Greenfinch |
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| Skylark |
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| Skylark |
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| Skylark |
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| Skylark |
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| Waxwing |
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| Waxwing |
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| Waxwing |
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| Mute Swan |
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| Blackbird |
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| Waxwing |
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| Waxwing |
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| Waxwing |
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| Waxwing |
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| Waxwing |
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| Shorelark |
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| Shorelark |
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| Shorelark |
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| Twite |
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| Peregrine |
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| Eider |
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| Black Necked Grebe |
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| Black Necked Grebe |
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| Goldeneye |
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| Black Headed Gull, Herring Gull, Common Gull, Oystercatcher, Carrion Crow, Jackdaw, Curlew |
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| Redshank & Turnstone |
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| Canada Goose, Mallard & Goldeneye |
Species seen - Bar Tailed Godwit, Blackbird, Black Headed Gull, Black Necked Grebe, Blue Tit, Buzzard,
Canada Goose, Carrion Crow, Chaffinch, Coal Tit, Collared Dove, Common Gull, Cormorant, Curlew, Dunlin, Eider, Goldeneye, Goldfinch, Great Black Backed Gull, Greenfinch, Grey Heron, Grey Plover, Herring Gull, Jackdaw, Kestrel, Lapwing,
Linnet, Little Egret, Long Tailed Duck, Magpie, Mallard, Meadow Pipit, Mistle Thrush, Mute Swan, Oystercatcher, Peregrine, Pied Wagtail, Red Breasted Merganser, Redshank, Ringed Plover, Robin, Feral Pigeon, Shag, Shelduck,
Shorelark, Skylark, Starling,
Surf Scoter, Teal, Tree Sparrow, Turnstone,
Twite, Velvet Scoter, Waxwing, Wigeon, Woodpigeon, Yellowhammer.
