An Osprey and a pod of Bottlenose Dolphins were the star attractions past Whitburn Obs early morning. It was a very quiet morning from the off with little bird movement and i was enjoying a rich tea with my Coffee when an Osprey flew into the view of my scope, it wasn't far out just on the close flag line. I quickly swapped my scope for my Nikon P900 on my tripod, relocated the bird and managed a little video. The whole episode was surreal as normally all of the local gulls go up if a large raptor passes but although large numbers of gulls were on the sea in front of the obs they didn't go up. Consequently id had no warning of its presence and i was looking straight out didn't have a lot of time to enjoy it. It was my first passed the obs since 2013.
The watch continued to be quiet when i noticed a pod of Bottlenose Dolphins heading north. The first was a pod of 10 or so that i could id as Bottlenose, the second pod of 4 followed and i saw a pale stripe, could the White-beaked be back, it seems early. Sadly the battery in my P900 was dead but i had my Sony video camera to capture the event. If its any good i will post a link later.
This is what i saw in order of appearance
Monday 16th May 05.10-09.00 WNW1-2 bright sun
Sandwich Tern 1n 107s
Common Gull 8n 43s
Gannet 35n
Common Tern 6n 5s
Black h Gull 2s
Puffin 2s
Red th Diver 4n
Ringed Plover 20n
Dunlin 8n
Arctic Tern 4n
LBBGull 1n
Common Scoter 20n 27s
Swallow 1n
Osprey 1n 05.55
Whimbrel 4n
Eider 4n
Red br Merganser 1s
Curlew 2n
Shag 3s
Bottlenose Dolphin 10+ north 07.40-07.55 then 4 08.05-08.25
