I like a good Guillemot and there are lots of reports of high numbers of them being seen close onshore along the east coast this year. There are concerns that there is something amiss with these birds.
Last weekend, on the Ythan Estuary north of Aberdeen, there were lots of Guillemots in the estuary itself which surprised me. It was easy to see 50+ in a scan of the water so there must have been many more. And they were close inshore – as I walked along the waterside, paddling in the water, there were Guillemots swimming within a couple of metres of me and I could see them swim under water and several caught small fish from the sandy banks of the estuary. I saw one dead Guillemot but then I saw a couple of dead gulls and a dead Oystercatcher too.
I’ll be following this with interest to see what people decide is going on. But the close-up views of Guillemots were a delight and distracted me from Trump’s golf course on the other side of the dunes.
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On Sunday I saw 5 razorbills very close inshore at a sandy beach at Dunbar (East Lothian). I don’t recall seeing any healthy auk so close to the shore before. I was suspicious, but the birds seemed to be diving normally and presumably feeding.