October 4th
Eden Estuary
It was nice to finally catch up with a Spotted Redshank, not a common bird in Fife with the Eden one of the best places to get them. Also here 2 Ruff, 3 Greenshank and 4 Little Egret.

Comparison of merganser and Goosander on the Eden.

 Ferry Hills Vis Mig

A busy time on the patch, i wasn't able to get there on Friday 5th October when Clive had a great skua day- 1 Long-tailed, 10 Pom, 6 Arctic and 9 Great.  It wasn't only skuas though with a whole variety of other species . Finches are typical late autumn movers and recently there has been a good run of Crossbills with Clive getting 20 on the 5th. More unusually, this autumn has seen a movement of Coal Tit with 80 going through on 5th. Obvious movement/dispersal of Coal Tit is certainly not something that happens every autumn. The likely reason for such good numbers and variety of species moving on Friday was the passing of a weather front allowing birds to get moving again in calm conditions.
With similar conditions forecast for Sat 6th I was hopeful but you can never tell of course. It proved to be another great watch-excellent numbers and variety. Best bird had to be a fem/Juv Hen Harrier moving west up the Forth. I haven't been able to time my visits for really calm weather recently so the Coal Tit movement hasn't been happening for me, this is a species that is reluctant to fly high in windy weather. Saturday was a different story and I got to experience the unusual spectacle of groups of Coal Tit lifting off high into the sky from the trees on the edge of North Queensferry towards the Forth Bridges totalling 82 birds. Other good counts were 1,890 Pink-feet,  263 Skylark, 385 Chaffinch, 30 Tree Sparrow and yet more Crossbills-15. No repeat of Fridays big skua day but I still got 9 Bonxie heading inland to add to the variety that makes Ferry Hills such a good migration site.

Sunday saw an approaching weather front that slowed down passage but the watch wasn't without interest with the first three Brambling of the autumn and more Crossbills.

A good movement of Crossbill at Ferry Hills in the past week.