1st November

Well I am back from what was a fairly quiet time bird and weather wise down on the Lands End peninsular. The weather for the first two days was a brisk westerly that then veered south to south east. Which brought a few days with dense fog or low cloud for part of the day. This put pay to a planned day trip to the Isles of Scilly from the nearby airport, as flights were sometimes cancelled for the whole day.
There were very few eastern vagrants and none at all from America. Talking to the local birders, this has been the worst autumn ever for birds migrating in this corner of the UK. My highlights were single Cory's and Great Shearwater, Sabines Gull, Short-toed Lark, Red-throated Pipit, Raddes Warbler (lifer), Yellow-browed Warbler and Siberian Chiffchaff. There were large numbers of finches on the move most days, with Redwings turning up from mid-week onwards. Also from mid-week it seemed that Black Redstarts were on most beaches and also in areas away from the coast.

I took advantage of a sunny start to one of the days to grab a couple of shots of Purple Sandpipers in Sennen.

Lands End was my early morning patch before the tourists turned up. Good for sea birds and a few other species.

Shags

Giant Black Redstart

Stonechat

Pendeen Lighthose and the rocks just off shore that sea birds funnel between if the winds are in the right direction. I saw Arctic Skuas, Scoters, 1000's of auks, Gannets and Kittiwakes.