Highest tally of Purple Sandpipers for 21 years!

On Saturday 2 March, a tweet from Rob Wil, had me driving down to Ness Point and initially saw 5 Purple Sandpipers feeding on the finger, then a further 4 Purple Sandpipersseen on the close rocks. Also on the finger, were 17 Turnstone, later more Purple Sandpipers joined them and on the far side of the finger was an incredible 14 Purple Sandpipers, all feeding the far end of the finger whilst the 17 Turnstone fed much closer on the finger. This is my highest tally for 21 years, since 1998 when I had up to 16 birds. After later checking Hamilton Dock, 5 Turnstones seen flying over the dock. Travelling back to Ness Point, up to 12 Purple Sandpipers seen on the compass rocks, plus 3 close Turnstones too. When the sun came out I settled down to take a few pics. Hazards for photographers included a constant procession of people wandering around the compass and forcing the Sandpipers to the far side of the rocks and the now well known shadow cast by the blades on the whirring Wind Turbines, turning a third of the shots into shadow. Finally, a calling adult winter Mediterranean Gull was seen flying over Bird's Eye Factory.