SOLWAY: Pacific Golden Plover at Dornock 6 September 2008.

Saturday morning did not look promising to say the least. Strong NE winds, a heavy sky with the promise of rain and the forecast was worse. The tide was not promising for pushing any waders close inshore on the Solway either. We'd have to wait until late afternoon for that but Browhouses is always worth a look just over the border. Conditions were pretty dire though and not too much on offer either - 25+ Golden Plover, 5+ Bar-tailed Godwits, 6 Snipe and a single Dunlin. With rain threatening we decided to a bit of exploring and tried a few new roads down to the Solway shore. Redkirk Point looked good but with the tide well out there was little about and a road out of Old Graitney produced little of note.

Pacific Golden Plover (centre, facing right with Golden Plovers and Lapwings), Dornock D&G 6 September 2008.

I was all for throwing in the towel and checking Castle Loch or chickening out completely and surrendering at Caerlaverock with the promise of coffee and hides. Mrs B on the other hand is made of sterner stuff and insisted that we check the remaining couple of roads west of Eastriggs. A large flock of Golden Plover and Lapwing were in a field at the top of a road to the shore at Dornock looked worthy of checking. The strong wind made things very difficult indeed but the rain held off as we started to search through the flock. One bird immediately caught the eye; a partial summer plumaged bird but with a "spangled" gold, black and white back. Suddenly the whole lot took off, spooked by a Sparrowhawk and landed out of sight. After a little while we relocated our "suspect" - very small compared to the Goldies, white supercilia, black belly with black bars invading a white flank and a dusky grey underwing seen on several occasions. Sure that it was at least a "lesser" Golden Plover I called Chris Baines, whom I knew was birding near the Nith and by the time he arrived the all-important tertial length had been noted (reaching almost to the tail-tip with very little primary projection noticeable). I managed just one shaky record shot (above) in the gusting wind.

Just before Chris arrived the whole flock (including a Ruff) was flushed once again by a Sparrowhawk and they flew down to Dornock beach (photo above) where we managed to relocate it and Chris put the news out - Pacific Golden Plover at Dornock (a first for D&G subject to acceptance).

After drying off and changing (I went up to my knees in the saltmarsh) we headed off to Southerness where we celebrated my 200th D&G bird with a nice bottle of Chilean Merlot.