Lapwing at Porth Hellick

An unusual record for this time of year was this Lapwing at Porth Hellick

  Except for Darren Mason observing a Purple Heron (27th July) from Watermill towards Innisidgen and amazing spectacle of high numbers of Great, Cory's, Manx and Sooty Shearwater with a Scilly record of 20+Wilsons Petrel (27th July) with the palegics on Joe Pender's Sapphire, it's been pretty quiet. Today waders at Porth Hellick included 2 Green and 1 Common Sandpiper, 12 Green and 1 Redshank, 4 Dunlin and a single Lapwing.

  On the evening of 26th July Rocky Robin and I did some seawatching off Deep Point and got 51 Cory's Shearwater in an hour. This was followed by 27 Cory's from the 17.20-18.50 on the 2nd August and from the Woolpack, Garrison we had 12 Cory's, 9th August.

This Lapwing showed well at close range at Porth Hellick (10-12th)

Also 4 Dunlin

2 Green Sandpiper

12 Greenshank

This Black-tailed Godwit was at Porth Hellick at the end of July but kept it's distance 

Moorhen

Grey Heron

Painted Lady

Starlings waiting for me to feed them

And here's Dave! Well it's a female but I didn't know that when I raised her from a baby over 3 years ago. All the press giving a bad impression of Herring Gulls across the country attacking dogs at the moment and swallowing them whole! I would maybe believe it if it was a mouse hound but a St Bernard!! Well that's the kind of crap you get from 'The Scum and Daily Fail' and people fall for it! The kids love feeding Dave as the parents take photos.

I'm a Creep playing in Israel!! Were selling out to war!!

  Radiohead played on occupied Palestinian land 2 weeks ago to Israeli's for a lot of money!! Great cover with some words changed to show the ole finger to Tom Yorke and his band for continuing to play despite 1000s of fans and Palestinians pleading for them not to. If you didn't know, Israeli are testing out their new fighter jets, F-35 on Gaza! If you watch mainstream news then you wouldn't of seen it.

   I recommend watching UK Column News. http://www.ukcolumn.org/

An honest news from the UK and that's not the BBC!! Give you the real facts, the truth and the sauces of where the news in coming from. Well worth watching. 

Here are the lyrics to Creep

Creep by Some F*#king People

When we got the call
Saw dollars in my eyes
We're supporting apartheid
But the pay's really high

I float like white phosphorous
Over Beit Hanoun skies

I wish I was ethical
We're so very unethical

But Im a creep
I'm playing Israel
What the hell am I doing here?
I don't belong here

I don't care if it hurts
I want to have control
I want a perfect paycheck
On Bibi's payroll

I don't even notice
No Palestinians around

I wish I was ethical
So very unethical

But I'm a creep
Playing Israel
What the hell am I doing here?
I don't belong here

We're selling out to war
We're selling out, to war, war, war, war

Whatever makes Bibi happy
Whatever he wants
We're here for apartheid
Palestine's occupied

I'm a creep
Playing for Israel
What the hell am I doing here?
I don't belong here
I don't belong here

2nd July record of Red-rumped Swallow for Scilly!

Bobby 'Dazzler' Dawson' found this cracking Red-rumped Swallow at St Agnes this morning. This evening Robin and I relocated it at Porth Hellick 

  At 07.30 this morning, Bobby 'Dazzler' Dawson' text to say he had observed on St Agnes, a great  record of White Wagtail breeding and at Broweth, only the second July sighting of Red-rumped Swallow on the Scilly after Geoff  Barter had a single in 2014! The swallow was only present in the morning and later on at 18.00, Robin picked me up and we thought we would try Porth Hellick to see if maybe it was there. First we stopped off at Porthloo and got a single juvenile and 2 2nd summer Mediterranean Gull. At Porth Hellick there were up to 20 Swallow, 5 House Martin and a very high number of 8 Sand Martin for this time of year. A Hobby flew through but after an hour of searching there was no sign of the red-rump. Robin wanted to go to Deep Point and as we drove past Porth Hellick I asked him to slow down so I could check out the hirundines on the wires. Still moving looking through the screen with my bins I said, I think I've got it! Sure enough it was there and we got cracking views as it stretched it's wings just above our heads from the path. Although very mobile, Martin was the only one who twitched it and it stuck around the area being harassed with the other hirundines by the Hobby.
  This is the first time I've been out for over a month but on the Tuesday the 4th, while playing football next to Nowhere, I heard a Serin and watched it come down into the garden. I could only put the news out at half time but ten minutes into the game I heard again and saw it perched on top of an Elm before returning to the garden!

There were 2 2nd summer and a single juvenile Mediterranean Gull at Porth Hellick

Reed Warbler

The swallow proved very mobile after leaving the wires

This Hobby made return visits to Porth Hellick

As soon as I open my door first thing in the morning, these lot are waiting and jump in and have a party!! If the door is slightly ajar, they are there hoping around my feet looking for spiders and currents!! 

While Ben was doing a great cover of the White Stripes song, the crowd were singing in their heads 'OH JEREMY CORBYN, OH JEREMY CORBYN' just like the millions across the nation even here on Scilly it's taken off and can be heard by both locals and visitors from The Mermaid Pub!!

Bolivian Salt Flats Tour 1

Anna crossing the worlds largest salt flat to go and look for some pepper at 11,000-sq-km in Salar de Uyuni, Southwest Bolivia! 

  Continuing the road trip in March in South America, we left Copacabana and made the ten hour overnight road trip with Bolivian Hop Bus to Lapaz. The following morning, with the same bus company, as you could have a discount, we booked a three day tour to visit the Salar de Uyuni salt flats in southwest Bolivia. That night we hopped onto another bus and again made an overnight drive arriving at Uyuni at 05.30! We were both very tired after continues traveling and it wasn't until 07.00 that the tour company picked us up from the bus stop with all our luggage!
  An hour later we in a 4x4 with five other folks including the driver and tour leader. Our first stop was a train cemetery, ten minutes out on the outskirts of town. We didn't really take to this because there were people everywhere walking around or on the trains with music blasting out from kids, topples, shades, caps on backwards and shouting as though everyone else is deaf! It did really feel like you were at an amusement park.

  

The area of the train cemetery that was so crowded that these were all the photos I could take without anyone being in the image! Believe me, it wasn't that exciting and after ten minutes we were ready to leave!

Puna Yellowfinch

  

 Our next stop was the reason why we came on this tour to see the largest salt flats in the world! One minute your on a dirt track and the next your traveling over the flats that seemed to end over the horizon! The sun was burning down and we spent most of the time out of the 4x4 on the flats taking photos. As you would expect there were lots of folks doing what we were doin or were we doin what they were doin? Including lunch we spent a good two hours in this area before moving on. I let the photos do you talking..

The number 1 ketchup, mayonnaise and mustard is called 'KRIS!' I had it with every meal including on my crisps although I got told off when I squirted it into the drivers eye while we were driving at night! It wasn't my fault. I asked for cheese onion and they gave me a block of cheese and a slice of onion! All they did have was salt and vinegar crisp and don't like the taste. So I put more ketchup on each crisp to get a better taste. It worked until the light inside didn't work no longer and I put the bloody mustard on instead! It a good job that didn't squirt in the drivers eye!

Having lunch

We had a bit fun with the camera on the flats

Anna found her Russian Federation flag

And I had the right T-shirt on in support of Palestine!

It's another from Mark Lanegan this time with Martinas Topley-bird Martina Gillian Topley-Bird (born Martina Gillian Topley; 7 May 1975)^[1] is an English vocalist, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist who first gained fame as the featured female vocalist on trip hop pioneer Tricky's debut album, Maxinquaye (1995). She also worked with him on his subsequent albums Nearly God and Pre-Millennium Tension (1996). In 2003, Topley-Bird released her debut solo album, Quixotic, which was critically praised and earned her a Mercury Prize nomination.

This was followed by Anything (2004), The Blue God (2008), and Some Place Simple (2010). She has also collaborated with Gorillaz, appearing on their album Demon Days (2005), as well as with Mark Lanegan, Diplo, and Massive Attack on Heligoland (2010), which she followed by a world tour with the group. Her work has been sampled by such artists as Stephen Marley, Berry Weight, and The Weeknd.