SHEAR DELIGHT

Friday turned into Saturday and I'm on my back lying on my sleeping bag looking up at 'baroli Hill' on Lundy. The group was spaced out to my right, along the path in front of the Hill, where we remained lying in silence with no movement to heighten our chances of hearing the birds whilst causing no disturbance. The wardens weren't far away. The manxies started calling around midnight, I find their call very hard to describe and the only thing it suggested to me was a Kittiwake with a deeper voice and a hoarse throat being throttled.

It was a new moon and I expected it to be pitch black but there was a brilliantly clear sky and I could see an incredible carpet of stars plus the odd white dot moving across the sky, which I presumed to be satellites, and the odd shooting star. You could briefly see the odd Manxie go over when low overhead or against the sky but nothing on the slope where their burrows were located. Before coming down last night, I'd received the news that the Little Shear had been seen on the previous night when calling continuously.

The Little Shearwater started calling/singing around 1am, the calls came from the top of the slope and I heard it on one side and the other so it was either flying back and forth and calling or landing and calling from different spots but you could see nothing. The call was very distinctive and nothing like the Manx call, a series of five high pitched notes, the last one with a downward inflection. The bird wasn't calling very often and I thought there was no chance of seeing it.

Luck smiled on me, the Little Shearwater came down from the Hill, heading towards the sea, and called from not very high above and away over to my left. I happened to be looking this way and the bird came in an out of view as it called. I saw it with the naked eye of course but it wasn't very far away and not very high up. Obviously, I couldn't make out any plumage detail and it was only the fact that it called that identified it. The next call I heard was behind me and over the sea.

My first thought was 'yes!' my second was 'did anyone else see it' ? The others were to my right and must have heard it as it passed by, the call being much louder than when the bird was at the top of the slope, but it showed so briefly that if you looked after hearing it, you couldn't have seen it.

The calls of the Little Shearwater stopped and the Manxies petered out. I drifted off to sleep, still lying in the same position which for some reason wasn't too uncomfortable. When I got up, most of the others had disappeared to find more comfortable spots to sleep. The first person I bumped into greeted me with the words 'well at least we heard it'. 'Damn' I thought subconciously as I explained my sighting and awaited the inevitable inquisition which was to come (and that's perfectly right as I'd react exactly the same). The other guys were ok about it although some said that they'd seen the bird and weren't sure. I don't understand this as the bird I saw was clearly the one that called but fair play to them if they're not sure. I have to say that being the only one in a group that sees a bird is probably worse than being the only one who doesn't. It certainly takes the shine off it.

However, I say it is not totally impossible to see this bird if it remains but I was extremely fortunate. I'm not sure of the circumstances on the previous night, but the bird was calling continuously on that occasion.

We were due to be picked up at 9am but for some reason the boatman couldn't dock until after three. I took the opportunity to do some more birding on this lovely island and check some of it's history. There still remains some wreckage of a German Heinkel bomber which crash landed in 1941. I heard that the guy who'd fallen down the steps on the previous evening had been in agony when the effects of the alcohol wore off and was airlifted to Hospital by chopper. Getting off later also meant listening to instead of watching the England match. Those bloody trumpets sound even worse on the radio !