Brian's birding blog: Brunnich's Guillemot in Portland Harbour

Saturday 28 December 2013

Brunnich's Guillemot in Portland Harbour

News broke boxing day of a very rare visitor being found in Portland Harbour and with family commitments I had to wait until today for my first opportunity to make the trip. The 168 mile drive was achieved in two and a half hours as we arrived in the car park at 7.30am. A number of birders were already on site and had started the search in the darkness but as we made the short walk towards them the bird appeared in the dim light and was quickly ID'd. As the morning progressed the twitch built up to a point when several hundred birders lined the length of the harbour in a joint effort to relocate the bird which dived regularly coming up a good distance from where it was last seen which made the job of photographing it more difficult but eventually I worked out a good spot to sit and wait and it duly obliged with several shots.

Brunnich's Guillemot

Great Northern Diver

Shag

Also in the harbour today were three Great Northern Divers, a Black Guillemot (my first in England and first in winter plumage), Guillemot, a couple of Razorbill, a Kingfisher, several Shags and twenty plus Mergansers. Two Red-throated Divers flew over too before we left. A couple of miles away we stopped at Radipole Lake where the visitor centre has suffered storm damage but remains open. We were informed of a Glossy Ibis in Radipole Park so made the 800yard drive parking by the swing park to find the Ibis feeding on a flooded football pitch and from the hedge line we managed to get a couple of pictures and watch the bird feed for an hour or so.

Glossy Ibis

Last stop on our trip was Walpole Park in Gosport where a Ring-billed Gull has wintered for a few years now. On arrival a local was busy feeding waffles to the gulls and amongst them was our target and a rather smart Med Gull too so again we managed a year tick and a couple of pics although by this time the light had all but gone so we jumped back in the car and started our 120 mile journey back up the A3.
A nice day with a great bird slightly bending my 2 hour twitch rule but well worth it and moving my year list to 285 with a lifer thrown in for good measure.