A bright, sunny start to the morning at Fly Flatts but clouding over by 0930 hrs, though , contrary to the forecast, it remained dry throughout the day with a moderate W>4 at 8 degrees.
A bit livelier this morning at Fly Flatts with a large flock of 103 Woodpigs over >NE, which, going by the height and speed, they were probably movers rather than pre roost birds.
A single Buzzard, Kestrel and Raven were present whilst a squadron of 45 Starling headed >NW with the winter flock of Starling up there is now up to around 500 birds moving around the fields.
Mid afternoon I initially set off for Redcar Tarn but seeing the Friday traffic queues through Denholme I turned off for Cullingworth to see if the gulls had returned to their original fields.
On arrival I found the gulls had moved a couple of fields down with around 2000 present in one field and several scattered around another 3 fields.
Viewing was much more difficult at this site as the high wall meant setting the tripod and scope up on a steep banking then standing half way up the banking to view but once in position it gave a good and not too distant view of the gulls.
An amazing sight to watch these bird blasting off and landing constantly but always settling back in the same area. One hour spent scoping, firstly checking the Black Headeds for Meds, then moving onto the Herrings for Yellow Legged and Caspian but nothing I could turn into anything special.
There were several very white headed 2nd winter Herrings but none that qualified for a Caspian.
Other birds present were Lapwings as well as a few Fieldfare and Redwing along with lots of Starlings.
Whilst I was stood on the banking near the roadside scoping it was surprising how many low mentality nuggets drove part finding it exciting to drive past with their hand on the horn in order to scare the birds with about 8 cars blasting in the hour I was there. What strange people we live amongst.
BS