A real mean morning at Fly Flatts with heavy horizontal drizzle, which I can put up with, along with banks of fog rolling through, which I can,t handle, all brought in on a moderate NE>4. As yesterday, the south shore was always visible but the east shore was blanked out most of the time and slowly deteriorating. By 0900 hrs I,d checked what I could , with poor results, so it was up stumps and head for home.
Back up there at 1500 hrs to a brighter, clearer outlook with steady rain throughout on a light but cold NE>3 but good visibility.
An intense scope of the east shore found no waders at all with around 150 big gulls building to over 300 before I left. I suspect this unusual gull invasion must be because of a shortage of shoreline over the Nab at TMR so the gulls are using this site instead as there are too many for chick watch and they rarely show any interest spending most of their time on the waters edge or scratching in the mud .
The south shore is now half under water, despite still being drained steadily, with water gushing in at both inlets and its looking like by the weekend it could be gone.
Waders were sparse with just the 1 Dunlin and 1 Ringed Plover along with 2 Redshank and 6 Common Sandpiper.
Yesterdays pair of Teal were still present in the far NW corner whilst in the sky Swallows and Swifts were piling through >N throughout.
A few more days of rain are forecast but I,ll not complain about that with a heatwave threatened for next week, thats when you will hear me moan.
BS