*NEW* Cape Verde Pelagics 🇨🇻 March 2026 - only 2 spaces left on this exciting pelagic package trip in the southwest corner of the Western Palearctic! 4 full-day pelagics, night visit to a Pterodroma feae colony, day tour of Fogo - based in the town of São Filipe. Info at www.windshearbirding.com

Christmas can be an expensive time of year, so how about something for free? The @scottishbirding.bsky.social and Scottish Birds Records Committee are hosting a FREE online conference over the evenings of February 24th to the 26th. Three talks per night and some real belters among them.

You want the best? You got the best. Not @jonnybirder.bsky.social and me... we only got @nomadbirder.bsky.social on the pod! ♠️ There's also shout outs to @scottinscilly.bsky.social and @jakegearty.bsky.social #TheTwoJonnies #Podcast #Seabirds #Secretary thetwojonnies.podbean.com/e/the-two-jo...

A great end to the week working on Tresco finding a pallid swift hawking around between the Abbey & Great Pool. Another top addition to a good start to Nov across the islands with two Pallas’s warblers, Richard’s pipit, dusky warbler, OBP, Rbfly & RND arriving in the last two days! #ScillyBirds

I have 3 spaces available for the 2026 Challenger Expedition to the continental shelf edge in British waters. See images below for more information, dates and contact details… #seabirds #UKbirding

Scilly’s first EYEBROWED THRUSH in 32 years! A real Scilly ‘Golden Era’ grip back for those of us not fortunate enough, or old enough, to be around for the remarkable run of SIX through the 80s & 90s. A proper stonker of a bird & a long overdue mega eastern thrush for the islands! #ScillyBirds

After two frustrating days the secrets of the St. Agnes mourning dove were finally revealed today! First for Scilly, first for England, sixth for Britain! A real heavyweight nearctic mega to get the pulses racing, and a very classy little bird it is too! #ScillyBirds

Just back from a pelagic trip out to the Whittard Canyon area on the continental shelf edge with @scillypelagics.bsky.social @scottinscilly.bsky.social @nomadbirder.bsky.social Madeiran Storm Petrel reclassified from MEGA!!! to scarce summer visitor in one evening with 84 counted last night! 😂

A couple of lovely nearctic waders recently delivered to Scilly by the early autumn westerly gales. Pectoral sandpiper, Porth Hellick. Buff-breasted sandpiper, St. Mary’s Airfield. #ScillyBirds #RareBirdsUK #ukbirding

Western Bonelli’s Warbler, present for its sixth day, showing very well in the Garrison Dead Pines this morning. Scilly’s 34th record of WBW - undoubtedly one of, if not the, most reliable place to see the species in Britain. #ScillyBirds #RareBirdsUK #UKbirding

Two lovely nudibranchs from Porthcressa Bay, Isles of Scilly. White-sparkled facelina (Facelina annulicornis) Four-lined polycera (Polycera quadriliniata) #MarineLife #UKWildlife

The excellent start to the Scilly Pelagic season continued last night with a great showing of 20 Wilson’s storm-petrels, 14 Cory’s shearwaters, and a 1s Sabine’s gull #seabirds #scillybirds #ukbirding

Our 10 year old son, Orkney, will attempt his first triathlon today on the Isles of Scilly 💪 raising money for Marine Conservation Society 🦑 and Island Haven ☀️ He will swim 0.5km 🏊 , cycle 20km 🚲 and run 10km 🏃‍♂️ Please sponsor him and show him your support 🙌 givestar.io/gs/orkneys-f...

A superb Scilly stormie session last night with 35 European storm-petrels ringed & released in just under two hours, a good total considering a 77% waxing moon. Our small team of helpers did a brilliant job, several of them enjoying their first ever stormie experience 🙌 #seabirds #ukbirding

#WorldSeabirdDay Back in March I visited Fogo where, during c.50hrs birding at sea & a night of research in the foothills of Pico do Fogo, I enjoyed the most intimate of experiences with the ultimate seabird - the Fea’s Petrel (Pterodroma feae). A lifelong ambition fulfilled 🇨🇻 #Seabirds

More excellent pelagic birding off Scilly yesterday with 6 Wilson’s storm-petrels, 6 Cory’s, 1 great & 1 sooty shearwater, amongst dozens of local Euro stormies & Manxies. Getting ‘the big three’, & multiple Wilson’s in one photo frame, in June is absurd! #ScillyPelagics #Seabirds #UKbirding 🪶

Wilson’s storm-petrels are steadily making their way in. Three on tonight’s Scilly Pelagic - two moulting adults and one fresh juv. - alongside 30 or so European storm-petrels. Two early Sabine’s gulls were a welcome bonus #ScillyPelagics #ScillyBirds #Seabirds

Wilson’s storm-petrels are steadily making their way in. Three on tonight’s Scilly Pelagic - two moulting adults and one fresh juv. - alongside 30 or so European storm-petrels. Two early Sabine’s gulls were a welcome bonus #ScillyPelagics #ScillyBirds

Tenerife blue chaffinch at Las Lajas yesterday. Bold, charismatic, vocal and confiding… they lived up to the hype! 5-6 birds in total around the drinking pools and picnic area.

Nice surprise only a couple of hours after arriving in Cornwall yesterday evening finding a gull-billed tern at Loe Pool. Always distant in poor light, but a cool bird nonetheless. Ironically the last one in Britain was just 100 yards from my front door, at Porthcressa last August! #CornwallBirds

Enjoyable rockpooling in Scilly this week, the highlight being this superb Polycera quadrilineata which performed beautifully for our safari group #ScillyRockpools #Nudibranchs 🦑

A little ray of Scilly sunshine… Male citrine wagtail on Bryher this evening. A top spring find by John O’Sullivan earlier in the day! Amazingly my first male citrine wagtail ever, anywhere! 🙌 #ScillyBirds

News from Fogo this afternoon that the lights will be turned off from today, thanks to swift action and communication by the Projecto Vito team 🙌

Am switching from Twitter and putting my last few posts from Twitter onto BlueSky: 2 Black-capped Petrels from pelagic, 4 miles west of Sao Filipe, Fogo, 21 March, around boat for 27 minutes by first last photo. This photo by Kirk Zufelt. #seabirds

Mist netting Cape Verde Petrel Pterodroma feae, 21 March, in conjunction with research of Projecto Vitó Cabo Verde (on Fogo) - Herculano Dinis, Jacob Gonzales Solis and team. 23 birds processed. Much learning. #seabirds

An exceptional first 3 (of 7) days pelagic seabirding off Fogo, Cape Verde with 18+ hours spent at sea and c.150km traveled so far. Many highlights, but this mornings black-capped petrels steal the headlines… undoubtedly the best ever views of the species in the Western Palearctic! #seabirds

First day on Fogo & an early morning seawatch from our São Filipe apartment balcony… no less than five minutes in & a black-capped petrel flies through my scope!! Large numbers of Fea’s petrels, Cape Verde shearwaters, red-billed tropicbirds, and a Boyd’s shear also. This afternoon we go to sea 🌊

This pied crow initially arrived on St. Mary’s for a day in late December before returning in February, settling in Old Town where it has been residing now for the past fortnight. Some interesting decisions to be made on the recent ‘influx’ of the species in to Europe! #ScillyBirds #rarebirdsuk

I have one space available on the 2025 Challenger Expedition to the continental shelf edge. The 2024 trip yielded Madeiran storm-petrels, barolo shearwaters, a fea’s-type petrel & much more, all in British waters. Sept 14th-22nd from Plymouth. Email [email protected] for more info #seabirds

A pleasant start to the birding year on the Isles of Scilly. Nothing remarkable currently, but plenty of chiffchaffs on the beaches, a couple of long-staying great egrets, a handful of black redstarts & plenty of ducks, divers & seabirds offshore are keeping it all ticking over #ScillyBirds

Pied crow around Hugh Town this afternoon! Can’t say I saw that coming, even with one lingering at Land’s End. The 26 mile sea crossing certainly adds intrigue when assessing the likelihood of them hopping the Strait of Gibraltar or the Channel. Regardless of origin, a very cool bird! #ScillyBirds

Little auk taken in to care yesterday after initial release attempt was unsuccessful. Unfortunately, but unsurprisingly, it passed away in the night. A sad end for Scilly’s first little auk since 2016 - a wonderfully charismatic little bird! #ScillyBirds #Seabirds 📷 courtesy of Mark Baker 🙏

🦑

Update by Dan Gornall on our Yellow-browed warbler project "1) Mainland Shetland > Carmel Head, Anglesey 2) Lundy > Lower Moors, Scilly. Especially interesting southerly re-orientation from Shetland. Many thanks to the ringers & birders who reported these". 📸Reg Thorpe. @alexanderlees.bsky.social

Still my favourite strand line discovery to date - a female Phronima sedentaria (‘monster in a barrel’) - Isles of Scilly, October 2023! An amphipod crustacean, she parasitises salps, devouring them from the inside, forming a vessel to raise her young 👽 #MarineLife 🦑 #ukwildlife

An excellent morning down the Porth Hellick ringing lanes with a dusky warbler, two yellow-broweds, four sibes (tristis) amongst the chiffs, a water rail added some variety, and I found a Richard’s pipit whilst showing the dusky to a crowd of two! November eastern magic 🙌 #ScillyBirds 🪶

#seabirds Some great opportunities on a superb island in 2025 🙌

As more people arrive to Bluesky, a reminder to use the Seabirds feed for posts relating to seabird research, conservation, pelagics, seawatching, expeditions, identification & photography. Like & pin the feed, and contribute to it by using #seabirds in your posts! 🌊🐦🙌 bsky.app/profile/did:...

A busy morning at Porth Hellick yesterday with a substantial arrival of chiffchaffs. Approx. 40+ moved through the ringing site from the coast over 3 hours, 24 of which were ringed including two Siberian chiffchaff. Also ringed of note was a yellow-browed warbler and a fieldfare #ScillyBirds 🪶