Quite warm and muggy again today but with an at times really brisk south-westerly always a feature. The sea came up with the best of the quality at the Bill with an early Sooty Shearwater doing several laps around the tide race during the morning and the summer's first Yellow-legged Gull lingering offshore during the evening; 7 Manx Shearwaters, 6 Common Scoter and a Sandwich Tern also passed by there. Single figure totals of both Swift and Sand Martin headed south over the Bill, whilst an out-of-season Yellow Wagtail also showed up there. Two Arctic Skuas taking the short cut between Lyme Bay and Portland Harbour were of interest over Ferrybridge, where 12 Dunlin, 11 Mediterranean Gulls and a Redshank also made the list.
A lone Harbour Porpoise passed by off the Bill.
A True Lover's Knot was a wanderer of note in the Obs garden moth-traps but the 'proper' immigrant tally there consisted of just 4 Rusty-dot Pearl, 2 Silver Y and a Diamond-back Moth.
Yellow-legged Gull - Portland Bill, 9th July 2016 © Martin Cade
...juveniles like this are pretty striking, even at vast range off the Bill; how is it that it took us until a dozen or so years ago to notice them? - were we just too inept to identify them before that or did they genuinely not get here in this plumage before that time?
