Winterton Wonders

A tweet from Tim on Sunday 27th October stating he'd found a Pallas' by the scrub at the base of Hermaness camp, had me driving to Winterton this morning. Parking was very difficult but I eventually found a space and as I was walking through it was really great to see former colleague Peter C and we had a quick catch up before I joined the assembled crowd (OFB, Paul W & others). It wasn't long before the fine Pallas' Warbler put in a brief appearance, appearing briefly in company initially with a Goldcrest, but the Pallas' was seen in vegetation right at the back looking through a sycamore tree, I saw it perched briefly for 2 seconds the obvious yellow supercilia bright olive green back and double wing bars clearly seen. It then went missing for 10 minutes before the soft "tsuui" call was heard several times and it was seen working left at the back always flitting about seen hovering in flight with lemon yellow rump, then it worked its way back to the green bush and left of there along a thick sycamore branch right out in the open briefly before it worked its way left again flew to another sycamore and by it's calls I followed it 30 yards further north, where it was seen again flitting about. Walking across the Dunes to the beach I walked around 400 yards north of the beach car park and joined a throng of 4 birders scoping the excellent Shore Lark perched on the sandy cliff just below the top over hand where it perched for a while before hopping down the cliff feeding and then it flew onto the beach in front of us but was eventually scared off by a dog and the constant stream of walkers and it flew onto a sandy spit by the sea (a long pool separated us from it and we managed a few pics before it flew onto our side again. Out to sea we saw a group of 8 female/ immature Common Scoter It later ran over to the edge of the beach by the marram grass and some more walkers pushed it towards us before a dog forced it to fly up to the cliff again. A tweet saying a BB Albatross had just been spotted flying north, we (Paul W, OFB and I) tried hard to see it but didn't!! Several Gannets seen including several immatures and several adult Gannets seen c40 seen. The Common Scoter flock or flock had increased to a total of 22 again all female/ immatures. OFB saw a flying raptor flying south and coming in off the sea it was seen just above the horizon, it was a female Marsh Harrier.