Sea watching and the games that 'men' play
Sea watching can be a dull affair. One of the frustrations (and joys) of this sport is that a sudden change of wind direction can kick start birds to move. So, if there is the promise of an onshore wind, it is best to be in place before it actually happens - after all, you don't want to miss anything. Sometimes you would wait... and wait... and the hoped for change never happened. If you are really keen on seawatching however, you may well stare out across the waves regardless of the weather conditions just in case... I used to seawatch an awful lot, 99% of this being at Dungeness. I'm pretty sure that between 1976 - 1991 I most probably saw the same individual birds move east in the spring and west in the autumn on an annual basis. Part of the joys of this particular branch of ornithology is the unpredictability of what will happen, the fact that the birds come to the observer (like an avian conveyor belt) and it is also the ultimate test of one's identification prowes...