More marine musings

The Safari was back on the wall at Patch 2 today. Not a lot happening on the early session a distant Grey Seal and fourteen Oystercatchers roosting on the beach that had somehow picked up a juvenile Sandwich Tern. The wind was just east of southerly and was quite strong giving just too much chop to be able to see any Harbour Porpoises, not that were going to today as later we heard news of a herd of 22 of them just over the horizon off Hilbre Island at the mouth of the River Dee. That's the largest concentration in the northern Irish Sea we've come across.

At lunchtime it was still choppy but we soon found two Grey Seals and later possibly had a third. 

Terns passed by in ones and twos, mostly Common Terns with a few Sandwich Terns thrown in including a juvenile or two. One of the Commons dived three times right in front of us and each time came out of the water with a small fish of a couple of inches long, possibly a Sprat or a Smelt.

We picked up one at range and it came ever closer even over the wall at one point, most unusual. Then it broke all the rules of being a tern - it landed on the wall not 20 feet (6m) away from us and we enjoyed scope filling views as it preened for ages. Risking flushing it we eased back a few yards then cautiously headed for the office an our spare camera. We approached carefully as there were other people about but fortunately they only went as far as the Mirror Ball before coming back roadside. Luckily it was raining quite heavily and that was probably keeping many of the multitudes at bay.  We took one distant quick snap just in case we flushed it as we too approached the Mirror Ball. Carefully we walked down the slope away from it but towards the spot we were at when it landed...Damn of damns a Lesser Black Backed Gull winged up from below the other side of the wall and flushed it!!! The eeeejiittttt!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Good job we got that dodgy first record shot off...

Where to next? More of the seaside same tomorrow. When will that pod of 5/6 Bottle Nosed Dolphins reappear?

In the meantime let us know what's landed where they don't normally land in your outback
LATE EDIT - It seems that the 22 Harbour Porpoises were actually 22 Bottle Nosed Dolphins.  A real Harbour Porpoise was found dead on the beach nearby, a victim of the BNDs?