The New Normal?

Towards the end of yesterday's post I mentioned that the forecast predicted a wet and windy night, and that I hoped a morning seawatch would be good. Well, the forecast was correct. The seawatch...?

By 07:35 the overnight southerly had veered to a south-westerly, which is straight onshore at West Bay. It was quite strong but a long way from gale force, and still carried some rain. I started up the BirdTrack app and had a scan. Two or three Gannets west in the gloom. Then a couple of Kittiwakes. A close Arctic Skua west. Nice. Very quickly the trickle became a small flood, as myriad auks, Mediterranean and Black-headed Gulls joined the fray. A distant small shearwater turned into a Balearic, then two Balearics, and I stopped trying to count Gannets and Med Gulls. It was all a bit hectic, and I began to worry about quality birds slipping past unnoticed. A distant shearwater rose into view momentarily before dropping into a trough after a couple of shallow flaps. Instant alarm bells! That was no Balearic. I tried to match my panning speed to its invisible track and guessed correctly. Up it came again, looking all stiff-winged like a big Manxie. It had to be a Great Shearwater, but was much too distant to make out any plumage detail.

Messages from Steve at Seaton: single Cory's and Great Shearwaters, a Balearic; plus even more Gannets, Kitts and auks than I was getting. It was all kicking off. Around 08:15 I had another large shearwater, this one close enough to clinch as a Great.

And so it continued, with good numbers of mostly routine fare but the occasional mega-range large shearwater defying specific ID. And then, around 09:30, a sudden pulse of large shearwaters. Almost every scan produced one or two, though mostly a very long way out. A couple gave good enough views to confidently ID as Great, but the rest were simply out of reach for me. No definite Cory's unfortunately. The closest shearwater of all was also a good one: my first Sooty Shearwater for many years headed W at 09:40.

I tried a lunchtime session, and another late in the afternoon, but added no more large shearwaters. The day's tally as follows:

3 Great Shearwaters, 27 unidentified large shearwaters, 1 Sooty Shearwater, 6 Balearics, 11 Arctic Skuas, 1 Bonxie, 117 Common Scoters, 1 Sandwich Tern. Plus uncounted Gannets, auks, Kitts and Med Gulls, all of which were well into three figures.

On its own, that list represents a fairly epic local seawatch. But in the light of what has happened elsewhere in Lyme Bay today, and at other points along the South Coast, it is nothing. For example, Portland Bill saw a movement of hundreds of Cory's Shearwaters this morning, followed by hundreds of Greats this afternoon! At Durlston (even further east than Portland): 350+ Greats and 50+ Cory's. At Berry Head: almost 800 Greats but not a single Cory's!

To give some context to all of this: in the most recent Dorset Bird Report (2021) there are no records of Cory's or Great Shearwater. In 2020, three records of Great, involving four birds; zero Cory's. Up to and including 2021, there had been just 21 Dorset records of Great Shearwater, ever.

Of course, further west, in the waters off Cornwall and Scilly, there have been ridiculous numbers of large shearwaters for many weeks now. Given a reasonable excuse, like weather or food, it wasn't difficult to imagine some of them heading this way eventually. But still, is this all just a bizarre one-off, or are we seeing the beginning of a new normal?