Black-legged Kittiwake

This was drive-in birding at its best. My mate Tom Backlund called on Saturday morning to let me know that a Black-legged Kittiwake was on the fishing pier in Hua Hin; coming from the north, turn left at the second set of traffic lights in Hua Hin, drive to the sea and the kittiwake is on the pier – too good to be true!  Circumstances were against me over the weekend but when I heard the bird was still in place on Sunday and Monday, I thought I really must try for it Tuesday morning.

On arrival at the pier at about 0915 this morning the Black-legged Kittiwake was visible from the car. Unfortunately the fishing pier is a rather dangerous and very badly dilapidated concrete structure so getting in close was not really feasible.Well it is, if you are prepared to walk along a tight rope of thin concrete where the possibility of tumbling into the sea must be about 50%. No, I am not  prepared to take that sort of risk with a camera and scope.

I rather fancy this is the same bird which has been around since November last year. Whatever, it is a long way out of its normal range, which would appear to be the North Pacific, probably Japan. It is a pretty rare visitor to these parts. I couldn’t tell you when it was first recorded in Thailand but it doesn’t get a mention in Lekagul and Round’s Birds of Thailand, published in 1991.

And of course I like easy twitches! It goes onto my Thai list as lifer ⌗379.