The Lincolnshire Bird Club

c 5000 of the c 7000 roosting gulls today were common gulls,
Pete Roworth, Cliff Morrison and i covered the entire 8km strandline
today as various seabird corpses are washing in , at present most of
the 45 corpses are razorbills and puffins with fewer guillemots and gulls
( 4 of the 10 puffins in breeding plumage).
most are fresh and have probably died from starvation /cold ,
we are surveying again tommorow and Cliff will survey Saltfleet Skidbrooke,
i will then collate data and send to RSPB beached bird survey.

Hi John,

Any showing signs of the oil that was reported (mainly of yorkshire) in the last few weeks?

_________________
George Rutter

only 1 out of the total so far of 78 corpses George.
species found highest numbers first, Razorbill , Puffin, Guillemot, common gull,
lapwing, black headed gull, herring gull, fulmar ,starling.
So at present an average of 10 corpses per km.
will update later when i have all the data.
regards John.

Cliff Morrison rang me this morning to tell he had seen an iceland gull
I was able to scope it on the Theddlethorpe beach, a 2 cy bird, took some finding amongst,
c5500 common gulls c 1700 herrings, c 800 black heads and about 70 gbbs
also a female marsh harrier over the dunes south bound.

A total of 105 bird corpses found along the nnr strandline thurs/fri
Razorbill 36 puffin 30, guilly 20, com gull 9 black head gull 2 herring gull 3
woodcock1 lapwing 2, blackbird 1
regards John.

Hello. Have any of you come up with any ideas as to what has happened to all the dead birds? So tragic

I think they have died of cold and starvation due to the gales rough seas and cold
I remember an event in the early 1980s when we found over 1000 corpses from Mablethorpe
to Cleethorpes, As reported on the local news live lobsters were washed up on the Yorkshire coast.
such was the effect of the prolonged easterly gales (over 2 weeks with winds of 35 to 50 mph) .
regards John.

Cleethorpes beach is currently littered with 1000's of starfish, crabs and razorshells. The gulls are having a real feast but I was wondering what has killed them. I was thinking back, have we really had extreme cold or extreme gales? Extreme? Maybe the weather at sea has been worse than I thought but what has upset the marine ecosystem on the south bank of the humber?

it's not confined to Lincolnshire, Colin. According to the news this week, the whole of the East coast has been affected with Northern Scotland being particularly badly hit. I nearly added a link about it in the middle of last week.


The gales may not have been 'extreme' but i understand that it has been one of the longest Easterly airstream for a long time and certainly the swell has been bad out at sea for a few weeks now.

James

Yes you are right there James, we have indeed had these easterlies for absolutely ages and they are still with us. Pity we didn't get them in October eh!