Midweek Outing – Great Cumbrae
The Outing (on Wednesday 25th October) started with 12 of us gathered in the Cal Mac Ferry Terminal at Largs getting tickets and catching up. When it was nearer the time the 10.45 ferry should be coming in, we all trooped out to form a queue at the barrier. After a while, with no sign of the ferry, a Cal Mac employee informed us it would be a bit late as there was only one ferry on at this time of year and the one running had a problem. When it eventually arrived, we discovered the problem was one of the ramps wasn’t working, so vehicles had to turn round at the top to face the working ramp which took more time. We all boarded and headed upstairs to start looking for birds, spotting jackdaw, eider, gannet, cormorant, shag, herring gull, common gull, great black-backed gull, Canada goose and a small flock of turnstone.
On arrival at the island, we discovered that the usual coach size bus had been replaced with a much smaller one and when all the passengers disembarked, we were not sure we could all fit on the bus. Those of us who had boarded first watched anxiously as the bus slowly filled up. We were particularly anxious about Harry who was the last person in the queue, but he did get on and the bus was so full no one else would have got on after him. Setting off for Millport (the bus going a bit slower than usual I thought) we added rook, mallard, lapwing, starling and oystercatcher to the list. I don’t know what the rest of the passengers thought about us shouting out sightings on the way!
It was a relief to get off the crowded bus into the fresh air and also nice to see the weather was dry and bright and not too cold. After spotting a lone pied wagtail on the pier, we headed uphill towards the golf course. On the way up we were treated to lots of different birds calling and flying to and fro, sometimes landing in hedges, on lawns and on the road, often giving good views. It took us quite a while to get up the hill to the farm beside the golf course because there was so much to see. Birds spotted in this section were robin, blackbird, goldfinch, woodpigeon, coal tit, chaffinch, house sparrow, grey wagtail, skylark, blue tit, feral pigeon, song thrush, fieldfare, dunnock, redwing, mistle thrush, goldcrest and great tit. When we could tear ourselves away, we set off over the grass hill towards Fintry Bay where we would be having a later than planned lunch. On the way we added raven, meadow pipit and long-tailed tit to the list.
The weather stayed dry with sunny spots over Bute and the Kyles of Bute as we had our lunch at the picnic tables right beside the water at Fintry Bay. Peter, who was eating and scoping at the same time, spotted a long-tailed duck with the eider. We all got great views of a male and a female which was the highlight of the trip for me and many others. We also saw a red-throated diver and two Bottle-nosed Dolphins from our lunch spot.
Photo copyright John Chapman. Reproduced with permission.
After lunch we walked along the road which followed the shore to the top of the island and back round to the ferry slip. On the way we added curlew, redshank, goosander, snipe, greenfinch, black-headed gull, heron and greylag goose to the list.
I have to thank the group members for putting up with the long trek to the ferry from Fintry Bay without complaint as I know some found it a bit of a long trek. We were lucky with our timing as the ferry came in just as we reached the slip. The weather had stayed dry, but overcast and our total count for the day was an excellent 51 species.
Agnes