• When here in the Outer Hebrides and looking at a bird, have you ever wondered how rare it is? The status of all species can vary enormously from island to island. How rare is Shoveler on Barra, has Stock Dove been seen on Harris, does Dotterel occur on Benbecula in the autumn, and how common is Blue Tit on North Uist? Well, fret no longer! The Status and Distribution of birds here on the Outer Hebrides has been completely updated and summarised for every species and each of the main islands and outliers. Available as an online resource at https://status.outerhebrides-birdreports.org/ or via our shop

    New - now available as an ebook

Local Rarity 11th December 2017

Hawkeye

Eyes and Ears Everywhere
The Braighe, Lewis
A Slavonian Grebe reported there today

Ruhba Ardvule, South Uist
A one hour seawatch this morning produced 2 Eider (S), 1 Common Scoter (S - female type), 2 Long-tailed Duck (1S 1N), 3 Red-throated Divers (2S 1N), 3 Great Northern Divers (N), 1 Gannet (S), 100 Shag (7S 93N), 2 Cormorants (S), 11 Great Black-backed Gulls (2S 9N) and 1 auk sp. Also present in the area were Wigeon 12, Tufted Duck 23, Goldeneye 2, Great Northern Diver 1, Cormorant 12, White-tailed Eagle 1, Common Buzzard 1, Ringed Plover 110, Dunlin 138, Black-headed Gull 2, Merlin 1, Hooded Crow 2, Raven 6, Meadow Pipit 5, Rock Pipit 2
 

MisterT

Always Birding
WeBS today a day late at Loch Bee and South Ford.

Loch Bee still had some ice on the shallower parts of the loch displacing some of the duck to slightly more inaccessible areas. The most numerous species on the water were 748 Wigeon, 368 Mute Swan, 180 Mallard, 161 Teal, 26 Goldeneye and 11 Whooper Swans. 352 Greylag and 40 Greenland White-fronts were on the west bank as well as 192 Golden Plover, 164 Lapwing, 41 Curlew, 24 Redshank and a single Greenshank.

Other species can also be recorded on WeBS and those seen today were 155 Starling, 2 Snow Buntings, 6 Linnet, 122 Twite and a flock of 68 Skylark. 40 Barnicle Geese were outside the count area on Ardivachar machair

On South Ford there were 106 Grey Plover, 177 Dunlin, 32 Ringed Plover, 31 Turnstone, 7 Knot 85 Curlew, 52 Shelduck and 2 Pale-bellied Brent Geese. There was also a flock of 15 Meadow Pipits.

Elsewhere there were 2 Little Egrets on Loch Mor, Benbecula at 13.30 and then I saw another on Oban na Buail-uachdraich by Heb Jewellery at 14.25. Not sure just how many are on South Uist at present. Pick a number between 2 and 4.

As reported by Chris, there is a large gathering of Bar-tailed Godwits in North Bay. They looked spectacular against a sky darkened by heavy snow filled clouds and a rainbow

barwits.jpg muteswan.jpg
Bar-wits, North bay & Mute Swan, Loch Bee
 

MisterT

Always Birding
Sorry but didn't list everything. I flushed 5, far fewer than expected but I can only record what I see.
 
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