Christine's walking & birds blog

Hundreds of geese, ducks, and waders took to the air in panic - for no reason that we could see, though we scanned the sky for a peregrine. I noted that one of the great black-backed gulls went up too and half-joked that perhaps it was their presence making the birds uneasy.

A minute later I walked to the other end of the lay-by and looked over the gate to see a great black-backed standing over a pale, bloodied blob in the grass; this turned out to be an adult male wigeon. The gull stabbed downwards with its bill and swallowed something - and I was then dismayed to see a sudden struggle by the wigeon, which I'd assumed was dead. But there was no chance of escape, and by the time I took this picture there was no further movement. This must have been an act of predation.


The gull eventually flew back to the muddy spit, and a little while later either the same gull or maybe its mate returned to the remains. Meanwhile a small gang of carrion crows, hoodies, and jackdaws had gathered, hoping for left-overs.


Birds of the Western Palearctic states that great black-backs catch puffins in mid air, while Jonsson says they're "able to kill full-grown ducks". A wigeon is quite a large, heavy duck, so I imagine the gull attacked it on the ground.

Otherwise, it was the usual suspects at Udale on this ferociously windy day; hundreds of pink-footed geese, loads of redshank and knot, a handful of black-tailed godwits, four or five Sandwich terns - and an osprey which sat on a distant fence-post until the tide started to turn.


One of several ruff present ran out along the muddy spit.


Meanwhile everything settled down, with ducks and waders seeming relaxed about the proximity of fearsome predators - although if a peregrine falcon or buzzard had flown over, they would all no doubt have gone up again in hysterically noisy panic. This mallard seems oblivious to the potential threat looming over him - but like the ducks, the gull now appears to be searching for invertebrates in the mud.


A windblown but exciting couple of hours before we drove back to the rainy west coast.