The original plan for Sunday was to meet up with Ian in Blairgowrie and head for Backwater Reservoir to try and find the Great Grey Shrike and possibly head up Glenshee to try for Ptarmigan. However, a run of reports of good birds in West Lothian and around the Glasgow area resulted in a change of plan for something rather more ambitious. We had 8 target species to try and squeeze in as well as a couple of birds we were highly likely to find. It was likely we would struggle to squeeze in all the sites we would need to visit. That didn't mean we wouldn't try. To save some time I suggested to Ian I would catch the earliest train to Inverkeithing and meet him there rather than start in Perth, half an hour later. This would add around an hour of available time for us to work with.
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Ring Billed Gull
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There wasn't much to be seen from the train given that most of the journey was completed in darkness. I met Ian at Inverkeithing and we crossed the Queensferry Crossing into Lothian. Our first stop was at a water-filled former quarry near Torphicen. We struggled to find a way in and a wrong turn took us up a farm track where a rather large dog took exception to the car and gave chase at full speed down the road. Thankfully we were inside the car as the dog was certainly not taking any prisoners. We parked safely out of range of Dogzilla at the entrance, leaving space for anyone needing entry and wandered in. Setting up the scopes looking down onto the pool I almost immediately found the
Ring Necked Duck that we were looking for. Unfortunately it was swimming away from us, so the photos are of almost no use, other than as a record shot.
Next up were the
Taiga Bean Geese near Slamannan. We knew where they had been reported on Saturday, so we headed there first. Thankfully they were still in the same field and we had rather distant views, though it was difficult to keep the scope steady in the strong gusting wind. Our next stop was at the same site where we had seen Ruddy Duck last year, but there was no sign this time around. Another bird I still hadn't seen for my 2020 list was Shoveler, and as we had seen plenty at Frankfield Loch last Autumn, we made a quick stop there. Unfortunately, there were no Shoveler around but
Canada Geese and
Lesser Black Backed Gulls (the expected 'others') were, so we gained a couple of year-ticks anyway. We made a quick stop at Hogganfield Loch to try to get Great Crested Grebe for Ian but there was no sign of any there.
A Yellow Legged Gull had been reported opposite Celtic Park on Saturday and would be a lifer for me, and a UK tick for Ian, so that was our next stop after Hogganfield. When we arrived at the car park for the Emirates Arena we found Roy and Carolyn already there. They had seen the bird briefly (found by Roy) not long before we arrived. We scanned through the ever-changing group of gulls up on the roof of the recycling company where the bird had been seen 24 hours previously. At one point I picked up a good contender in flight but it disappeared off to the south. We were joined by a birder I follow on Twitter (@southsidebirder) who said it spends time in a park in that direction. He headed off to check there.
Carolyn eventually refound the
Yellow Legged Gull and we were able to get a decent view (and a few photos) before the whole lot were flushed by something unseen. As we'd spent a fair bit of time and still had 3 more targets to try and see we decided not to linger. We headed off for Strathclyde Country Park for the wintering Ring Billed Gull which had been reported on Saturday. As we drove out along London Road I spotted what looked to be Waxwings in a tree on the opposite side of the road. Ian managed to get turned and we confirmed that they were indeed Waxwings - a year-tick for Ian.
Water levels at the Loch were rather low so there was plenty of places for gulls to lounge around and with the scope set up I started scanning from the left. There were lots of Black Headed, Common and Herring Gulls but no obvious sign of the actual gull we were looking for, though I had barely covered 90 degrees of our view when Roy and Carolyn joined us. Carolyn was again the finder of the target bird - finding the
Ring Billed Gull perched atop a buoy, where a Common Gull chased it down onto the water before it relocated to a larger buoy much closer to where we were. By now it was after 1330 and we still had a couple more targets to try for. The weather was looking less promising than earlier and we knew the light would begin to go around 1500.
We were headed for Balloch and Mandarin Ducks next. As we headed along the motorway it began to rain, though thankfully more drizzly rain than the soak you to the skin sort. It wasn't raining when we reached Balloch and a quick walk down to the river found a couple of drake
Mandarins among a host of Mallards and gulls being fed. A female Mandarin was tucked in below the trees. Another successful, and more importantly - brief stop. The overcast conditions were reducing the light even further but as Ian had seen White Fronted Geese near Gartnacharn fairly recently he knew the particular road to drive along to give us the best chance at our final target species. It did take a fairly lengthy drive along the single track road before we found a field with a decent sized flock of
Greenland White Fronted Geese and Pink Footed Geese in it.
As it was by now around 1445 we headed back eastwards - seeing a few large flocks of geese in fields, with a particularly large flock between Thornhill and Doune in a stubble field - mostly Greylag and Pink Footed from the rather quick scan from a moving car (as the road was relatively busy and with nowhere to pull into to check properly). Ian dropped me off back at Perth Station around 1615 after a very successful outing with 8 year-ticks (in bold) out of 10 potential targets seen. It had been a very busy and productive day's birding although we only saw a total of 39 species. It was certainly far more successful than our first attempt at a westerly trip in 2018 when we dipped on Ruddy Duck, Ring Necked Parakeet and the Taiga Bean Geese - the first and last named twice in one day.
Species seen - Dundee to/and North Couston Quarry - Blackbird, Herring Gull, Black Headed Gull, Woodpigeon, Carrion Crow, Magpie, Mallard, Goldeneye, Tufted Duck, Ring Necked Duck, Mute Swan, Little Grebe, Grey Heron, Grey Wagtail.
Mammals seen - Brown Hare.
North Couston to/and Slamannan - Chaffinch, Starling, Kestrel, Taiga Bean Goose, Jackdaw.
Slamannan to/and Hogganfield Loch - Canada Goose, Lesser Black Backed Gull, Common Gull, Coot, Moorhen, Gadwall, Goosander, Feral Pigeon, Whooper Swan.
Hogganfield to/and Strathclyde Country Park - Yellow Legged Gull, Pied Wagtail, Fieldfare, Waxwing, Ring Billed Gull, Cormorant, Greylag Goose.
Balloch/Gartnacharn - Mandarin, (Greenland) White Fronted Goose, Pink Footed Goose, Blue Tit.
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| Mallard & Goldeneye |
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| Ring Necked Duck |
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| Taiga Bean Goose |
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| Taiga Bean Goose |
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| Herring Gull, Yellow Legged Gull & Lesser Black Backed Gull |
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| Yellow Legged Gull & Herring Gull |
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| Yellow Legged Gull & Herring Gull |
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| Great Black Backed Gull, Herring Gull & Jackdaw |
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| Waxwing |
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| Common Gull |
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| Common Gull |
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| Common Gull |
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| Ring Billed Gull |
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| Ring Billed Gull |
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| Ring Billed Gull |
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| Ring Billed Gull |
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| Ring Billed Gull |
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| Grey Heron |
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| Mandarin |
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| Mandarin |
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| Mandarin |
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| Greenland White Fronted Goose & Pink Footed Goose |
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| Greenland White Fronted Goose |
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| Greenland White Fronted Goose |
Species seen - Blackbird, Black Headed Gull, Blue Tit,
Canada Goose, Carrion Crow, Chaffinch, Common Gull, Coot, Cormorant, Fieldfare, Gadwall, Goldeneye, Goosander, Grey Heron, Grey Wagtail, Greylag Goose, Herring Gull, Jackdaw, Kestrel,
Lesser Black Backed Gull, Little Grebe, Magpie, Mallard,
Mandarin, Moorhen, Mute Swan, Pied Wagtail, Pink Footed Goose,
Ring Billed Gull, Ring Necked Duck, Feral Pigeon, Starling,
Taiga Bean Goose, Tufted Duck, Waxwing,
(Greenland) White Fronted Goose, Whooper Swan, Woodpigeon,
Yellow Legged Gull.
Mammals seen - Brown Hare.
