Skua surprise

I had a great morning's birding with Eddie today. Started at Cricieth in the hope of some skuas following last nights wind and rain. Plenty of Manxies out there but all distant. Moving on to Morfa Bychan the birds were much closer with terns  Gannets kittiwakes and Manxes in big numbers in the estuary mouth  and further out. I couldn't believe it when a distant skua I'd picked up flew closer to revealed itself as Long tailed. Very unexpected  - especially as it was the only skua we saw. It chased a tern briefly  which baffled me slightly - I've only seen them dip feeding in the past. It disappeared amongst the waves but reappeared again much closer half an hour later before moving off west  over the breakers.
What a stunning bird! I managed a few snaps at full zoom and looking through the pictures this evening  it just struck again what a beautifully  built, aesthetically  pleasing  creature it was. Whatever pose it was caught in is looked perfect for a logo! It just couldn't look bad whatever it did. The again, maybe I'm biased

 


A little tern joined the Arctic and Sandwich terns feeding in front of us before hypothermia set in  and we headed inland to Cae Dafydd near Nantmor. Here we  had nice views of Pied fly, redstarts and tree pipits as well as hearing a few wood warblers before finishing with a panad in Caffi Gwynant -  a great day out