21 April 2014

Black Monday







Some Black Scoter at Yakumo this afternoon....................




It was a beautiful clear spring weekend and I was in Yakumo the last couple of days.

There was a small group of Black Scoter in a kind of lagoon (pond) away from the open sea. They looked very tired, I guess they were on their way north.

They were a little jumpy at first.



But they eventually drifted close to me and my camera.












There were many more on the sea, mostly involving a dozen or so males trying to mate with a single female.

They flew off as soon as I got close............




Yesterday on the same pool as the Scoter was this male Long Tailed Duck, this wasn't as confiding though.


There were lots of ducks around the last couple of days. Shoveler were the most noteworthy abd Great Scaup were the most numerous.

2 Tone birds are difficult to photograph in bright sunshine.








Some pretty interesting birds around the last couple of days: Bar Tailed Godwit, Little Ringed Plover, Great and Little Egrets, Eastern Marsh harrier, Osprey, Wryneck, Kingfisher, 7 species of gull, Black Necked and Red Necked Grebes, a small flock of Whooper Swans with a lone White Fronted Goose, Long Tailed Rosefinch, Reed Bunting and lots of common stuff arriving too............................

Ah Liverpool. It's within touching distance.

11 comments:

  1. Just superb shots of the scoters Stu.

    Sorry if I confused you.Pictures of a hoopoe from elsewhere. Why twitch a Hoopoe, they turn up regualarly enough if only people would go out and look for stuff instead of relying on pagers.

    I might twitch scoters if I could get views and shots like yours.

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    Replies
    1. I would have dropped everything for the Hoopoe though.........

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  2. Colour me incredibly envious, as usual.

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    Replies
    1. Thanks for the comment, yes they are usually way offshore in the UK................

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    2. Yes! Even at 2800mm they're not much more than dots off Blackpool. I'm hoping to see a surf scoter soon though, there's been one inshore at Musselburgh :)

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  3. Wonderful pics of the Black Scoters. Nice exposure of their black bodies. They are quite stunning and obvious with the yellow bills.

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    Replies
    1. I was very lucky with the lighting Russell............

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  4. I really miss shooting photos of ducks in Japan! They're so tame there. Here in Thailand, all the ducks are super wary. We need telescopes to see them!

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    Replies
    1. Hi Ayuwat, I think these were tame only because they were exhausted...............

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