The Kirkudbright Five viewed across the Dee from Gibb Hill, 1 September 2008.
We left the Mull in pleasant September sunshine and a slight chill in the air. Autumn has arrived! Unable to leave without a last look at Loch Ryan we called in at Bishop Burn where the Pale-bellied Brent Goose was present and 11 Knot but nothing of interest in the gulls. The lay-by by the cafe was notable only for the cafe being actually open (another D&G first hot on the heels of the pub in Carsethorn being open last month). The caravan site lay-by was better though with signs of winter in the form of rafts of Red-breasted Mergansers, Eiders, 5 Scaup, a single drake Common Scoter and surprisingly an adult Slavonian Grebe.
Just as we were passing the Kirkudbright turn off on the A75 the news came through that all 5 Spoonbills were present on the Dee. The Birdguides website (other bird information services are available) states that "the D&G grapevine was red hot" with the news of these birds (?), the pair and the three juv's indicating that breeding had taken place locally. The media were due to visit too. What fun! So on arrival at Gibb Hill Mrs B. and I purchased our tickets from a spiv-like birder from the home counties who was also selling stockings and Rolex watches. We made our way through the throng of paparazzi and found a few spare square feet to set up our tripods. Many of the photographers were lined up, hoping to get a snap of one of the Spoonbills maybe getting out of a taxi or something and apparently contracts were being signed for Channel 4's "Big Birder" and BBC's "Strictly Come Filter-feeding". Fed up with all this Mrs. B and I shunned the chance of an interview, left the local celebs and drove off in search of peace and quiet and a locality where we knew there would be no birds.In keeping with our "Never drive past Caerlaverock" policy we called in. Not much about apparently so we popped in to the "Phalarope? What Phalarope?" hide where there were 20 or so each of Shoveler and Teal but no Garganey as far as we could see. A dash down to the "You should have been here 10 minutes ago tower" was a pretty fruitless exercise but we did locate at least 4 Ruff and about a dozen Golden Plovers in a Lapwing flock from a hide that I haven't made up a silly name for yet.
The rest of our trip back home was rather uneventful despite stops at Seafield Bay (6 Black-tailed Godwits) and Browhouses (5 Greenshank, 3 Goosander and a Peregrine). Still there's always next week.
