The Booby is on the Bishop

 

Currently the most famous lighthouse amongst birders, Bishop Rock has hosted the Red Footed Booby for two weeks at the time of writing.  Getting there was Thursday’s task, and we set off from Austin’s at 1am to get on the ferry from Penzance at 9.  After some heroic driving from him and the ferry crossing surrounded by shearwaters, with sunfish and tuna, and a brief and wonderful cameo from Risso’s dolphins, we disembarked and immediately got on a Booby special pelagic boat.  By late morning we were watching the Red Footed snooze high on its perch, elated at seeing such an incredible bird and more than a little tired from travel.  

Cory’s Shearwaters were beyond ubiquitous - by far the most numerous bird of the four days of boat trips and birding.  I know this is likely an overall bad news story in that their Mediterranean habitat is suffering severely under climate change, but I have to temper my concern about that with personal joy at how many there were to see, or I would have to despair at the state of the world.  They came in close as we drifted and were constantly wheeling over the water, and I’ll never look at a seawatch the same way again: seeing distant birds blurred on the horizon, straining to see them to the point of migraine… no thanks, not for me.  Seeing every detail on the bill of a Cory’s Shearwater as it shears the water with grace I can’t begin to describe has put seawatching into context for me.  I know some people love it, but my eyesight isn’t good enough to really cope with the distances involved.

Thankfully not suffering from seasickness (you never know as you get older - I used to love rollercoasters but can’t abide them these days!), we headed back to camp at the Garrison and spent a quick hour sorting stuff out before heading back for the shark pelagic in the evening.

The magic of seeing European Storm Petrels and Great Shearwaters (the most handsome bird of the trip) in a darkening sky, with blue sharks tagged and released was topped off by four Wilson’s Storm Petrels in the slick, dancing on the waves with those yellow stained glass feet dangling below them.

The Friday brought sunshine and a morning of searching successfully for adult male Red-backed and juvenile Woodchat Shrikes, while searching for more common migrant birds.  The late afternoon and evening we were booked on another pelagic, and that’s where we encountered the South Polar Skua, but that’s worth a separate account.