Raining cats & dogs and blowing a hoolie

We knew is would be a bit rough again today and we were not wrong. The wind howling around the roof of the house last night was a good clue that it was going to be a testing day for both us and the birds.

Strong winds and a mixture of  heavy rain and drizzle had us looking for some kind of shelter. We didn't bother with our usual patch and headed straight the Norwick area. The first garden still held a redstart and robin but it is a really hard area to see into; shame as it is really calm in these strong winds. The oat crop next to it held a willow warbler and a couple of blackbirds

The garden at Valyie was incredibly windy being high up the side of the hill but at least the 'back edge' was calm. We split up and Nick bagged a male redstart and dunnock at the back of the garden while I added a chiffchaff and yellow browed warbler. Conditions were awful so it was a surprise that we saw so much. Lesser whitethroat, 3 blackcap, brambling, robin and 2 mealy redpoll were in the two gardens in the valley. There seemed to be an increase in thrushes with 4 redwing and 2 song thrush in the area.

On the drive over the Skaw we flushed the most bedraaggled bird I think I've ever seen. The poor little common redstart looked so sad trying to shelter out of the rain. It was seen by several others so hopefully is will make its way to warmer places soon.

The birds were pretty much the same at Skaw as they have been over the last few days. The very wet reed warbler was in the nettle by the stream as was the blackcap and chiffchaff around the back of the buildings. As we moved through the back of the croft I flushed a bird out of the grass and onto the wall in the corner, a lovely little bunting and a nice find. The bird flew round the end of the building and despite searching, we couldn't relocate it (it was still there in the afternoon visit)

A brief look at the Burrafirth burn produced out first reed bunting of the trip and the reed warbler still present.

We revisited the morning sites in the afternoon adding our first trip tree pipit at Valyie and a 2nd reed warbler at Skaw but that was it and the weather finally got the better of us.

Weather looks better for tomorrow so we are going to find the 'big one' then. You heard it here first