7th September 2019 - Day 2 of Spurn Migfest

The night before we went to bed at a reasonable time as we knew we had to get up early today due to the forecasted strong NW winds. Max and I arrived at the Spurn Seawatching Hide at 6am and stayed through till 11am and were lucky that we got a seat inside. Although it didn't turn out to be an absolute classic seawatch there was still plenty to keep us interested with the main highlights being: three Pomarine Skua, 25 Arctic Skua, 13 Great Skua, one Sooty Shearwater, nine Manx Shearwater, two Puffins, 24 Red-throated Diver, an Arctic Tern and a single Pale-bellied Brent Goose. A Merlin also flew over The Warren early morning causing some excitement amongst the large assembled crowd. 

1 of 3 Pomarine Skuas, Spurn (courtesy of twitter)

A large crowd assembled for the mornings seawatch 

After our swatch we again went back to the Canal Scrape hide and had a look on the wet flash here again the birds of note were a Green Sandpiper, a Dunlin and a Little Egret. We also had some amazing views of recently fledged Swallows right outside the hide, they were so tame you could virtually walk up to them. It was great to watch them and the adults periodically coming back to feed them.

Juvenile Swallow, Canal Scrape, Spurn

Juvenile Swallow, Canal Scrape, Spurn

Dunlin, Canal Scrape, Spurn

We drove back to the campsite and had a bite to eat and then headed to Kilnsea Wetlands where again we found one Curlew Sandpiper, one Wood Sandpiper and had distant views of the White-rumped Sandpiper. Also of note were a lone Pintail and good numbers of Mediterranean Gulls. We drove round to Sammy's Point afterwards and upon arrival found two Whinchat and a Wheatear in the horse paddocks as well as a female Reed Bunting and a juvenile Whitethroat hiding away in some dense scrub. Whilst out on the mudflats were 10 Redshank, 11 Dunlin, eight Knot and two Whimbrel. 

Wheatear, Sammy's Point, Spurn

Although the sea had really dropped off by the time we left I was still keen to go back and have another look. Max and I ventured back down to the seawatching hide and we added an additional four Manx Shearwater and a single Great Skua. With not much going on we walked halfway down the point and found three Wheatears, a Chiffchaff, a Whitethroat, three Yellow Wagtails and surprisingly a Guillemot which flew straight over our heads low and landed on the sea, presumably it had just come off The Humber? 

Feeling pretty windswept and tired we called it day with the sun going down. We headed back to the Crown & Anchor for dinner and a pint of Landlord and enroute we added a sizeable flock of Tree Sparrows but were unsure on how many there were.