An early start with a great sunrise but a pretty slow couple of hours at the railings this morning with a single Manx, a few auks, 6 Common Scoter, an "on-the-deck" Chough risking life and limb feeding within the dog-walking area, and several Red-throated/Great Northern Divers past and offshore. Until that is, when at around 10am Liam picked up a "#%$£ing Grebe flying out of the bay!" Grebes of any sort are rare at St Ives - especially #%$£ing Grebes - so this was one we needed. However, as soon as he'd picked it up it landed and disappeared into the waves and was lost to view.
Myself and Liam have found. or refound, some decent birds recently and at each of these events there has been an element of frustration whilst the bird in question threatens to disappear from view, or doesn't give up its ID features easily. It's during these times that Liam feels he is ... ahem .. "able to express his emotional investment in the process through the medium of kicking the nearest available railing". At the Blue-winged Teal it was the railings at Lelant Saltings, at the Pallid Swift outside the Tate it was the Porthmeor Beach cafe railings that were the chose "medium". And lo, it came to past that as the "#%$£ing Grebe" pitched into the drink, 2kms offshore, into a melee of feeding Guillemots the railings at the NCI building were soon ringing like a tuning fork at F#sharp.
However all was not lost. 20 minutes later Liam picked up the #%$£ing Grebe 100 metres offshore, close in and about to swim around the corner - and it had turned into a Red-necked Grebe! An absolute MEGA for St Ives and a very decent bird for West Cornwall and especially on the North coast. A recent Red-necked at Penlee Point was seen by many and so the fact that this one was not seen again will not cause too much consternation. But a mega for us and gets the St Ives 15K 2026 off to a flyer
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