Fea's Petrel passed a packed Whitburn Obs today plus 72 Sootys and a Long tailed Skua. We were enjoying a canny sea watch when news came through of a Fea's past Flamborough 8.15-8.25, we didn't get too excited as in the past we haven't done well connecting with Fea's coming from Nth York's. Then it passed Filey at 9.00 we started to get interested and when it passed Long Nab 9.45-9.47 phones started to ring. Birders were turning up at the Obs who hadn't been seen sea watching all year, a twitch was on. No news came for ages and it became apparent the bird hadn't passed Hartlepool. Then we got a call from Ando to say he had the bird at Seaham at 2pm.We didn't have long to wait, it came fairly close inshore past the obs at 14.15-14.35 and even dropped into a flock of feeding birds and hung around awhile before heading off north.20 birders in the Obs and another 20ish outside the obs got the bird.
Suffice to say a lot of happy birders enjoyed this hard to catch up with Petrel. The audiance was too large for me to name them all but congrats folks!
This is what we saw today in order of appearance
Sunday 21st September 06.30-15.00 NNW2-3 cloud cover
Black h Gull 299n 15s
Red th Diver 15n 33s
Curlew 10n 2s
Common Gull 17n 3s
Common Scoter 13n 2sPuffin 14n
Sooty Shearwater 72n
Arctic Skua 10n 24s
Whimbrel 1n
Manxie 103n 13s
Teal 10n
Common Tern 105n 16s
Redshank 16n
Grey Wagtail 3n 3s
Shag 4n 27s
Bonxie 16n
Wigeon 54n
Brent Goose 14n db, 3n pb
Velvet Scoter 5n
Sparrowhawk 1n
Eider 2s
Arctic Tern 1n
Golden Plover 7n
Knot 28n
Sandwich Tern 1n 12s
Goose sp 50s
Swallow 8n
Grey Heron1n
Long tailed Skua 1s ad
Red br Merganser 3n
Kestrel 1n
Tufted Duck 3n
Purple Sandpiper 2n
Pintail 1n
Porpoise 2n
14.15 Fea's Petrel nth till 15.35
Yippeeeeeee
