Back in July 1988 I was on a "Scillonian pelagic", a birdwatching trip on the Scilly ferry that had been chartered to visit the "Wilson's triangle". Back in those days Wilson's Petrel was thought to be very rare in British waters (it isn't) and we were successful in seeing one. But on the way back a prominent and well-respected birder pointed and yelled "South Polar Skua off the back of the boat!" I saw a Bonxie-like bird for a second or two before it was lost to view against the sun. The claimant seemed absolutely convinced of the identification, but I never heard anything else about the record after that. South Polar Skuas are regularly seen and photographed in the North Atlantic, but seemingly only on the American side. There are three accepted records for Britain, but all have involved exhausted birds where I think DNA proved their identity (Dorset 1996, Scilly 2001, Glamorgan 2002). An Irish "seen only" bird was rejected as not proven (Clare 2007). The bird I saw may well have been one, but I think the claimant felt he was not going to get an unphotographed brief view accepted as a British first.

As you can see from this photo, South Polar Skua is very similar to Bonxie www.flickr.com/photos/timmelling/51205128824/in/photolist but a bit more uniformly dark without the pale flecking. This one was photographed in Antarctica itself where the only confusion species is Brown Skua, which generally inhabits slightly warmer areas further north. They do have different colour morphs and pale ones are much easier to identify: www.flickr.com/photos/timmelling/25774717240/in/photolist

Tags:   Stercorarius maccormicki South Polar Skua Antarctica Tim Melling

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If you look at the trailing edge of this Blue Whale's tail flukes you can see lots of pendulous barnacles. These are Tassel Barnacles (Xenobalanus globicipitis), which translates as "strange barnacle, with a round head". They are not parasitic, as they merely hitch a ride to feed in the plankton-rich waters where the whale feeds, but they do increase drag on the whale. They only occur on free-moving marine creatures, especially whales and dolphins, and are globally widespread. This tail is massive by the way. It typically spans about a quarter of the body length, so if an average Blue Whale is 30m long, then the tail flukes will be 7.5m across, so each side will be about 12 feet across, making 24 feet in total. So I would estimate that each Tassel Barnacle is about 4 to 5 inches long.

I photographed this tail-fluking Blue Whale in the Sea of Cortez. The scientific name is Balaenoptera musculus. Balaenoptera means "winged whale", simply because this genus have dorsal fins, unlike the Right and Bowhead Whales (Balaena spp). Now for the "musculus" bit. Mus is the Latin word for a mouse, but musculus has two meanings. It can mean little mouse, but it can also mean muscle. Now muscles were named because they supposedly resembled mice moving under a sheet (especially the biceps), a bit like the old Tom and Jerry cartoons when Jerry ran under the carpet and the bulge moved along. Now the really odd thing is that Linnaeus named the largest animal on the planet, the Blue Whale with the same name as one of the smallest (House Mouse - Mus musculus). Presumably Linnaeus was thinking of muscle rather than little mouse when he bestowed the name musculus on Blue Whale. Though it has been suggested that Linnaeus might have chosen musculus as a pun.

Tags:   Balaenoptera musculus Blue Whale Xenobalanus globicipis Tassel Barnacle Baja Mexico Tim Melling

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White Ibis breeds in large numbers around the coast of southeast United States, both coasts of Mexico, the Caribbean and into Colombia and Venezuela. But here it overlaps and hybridises with the closely related but markedly different Scarlet Ibis. I don't have a photo of Scarlet Ibis but here's one from my friend Paul Ellis: www.flickr.com/photos/the_treerunner/47180710462/in/photo... Their hybrid offspring are pink, but most pairs breed true even where their ranges overlap. Some authors treat them as colour morphs of the same species. Its scientific name Eudocimus albus oddly translates as "beyond excellent, white" (Scarlet Ibis E. ruber is beyond excellent, red). Although I see them commonly in the mangroves of Baja I don't often get a view close enough to see the blue eye and the leg scaling so I thought I'd upload this shot. The favourite food is crayfish, but they also eat fish and insects.

Tags:   Eudocimus albus American White Ibis Baja Mexico Tim Melling

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Xantus's Hummingbird is only found in the southern part of the Baja peninsula, and nowhere else in the world. Its scientific name used to be Hylocharis xantusii (Hylocharis means woodland beauty) but it was transferred to the genus Basilinna (title of various Ancient Greek queens) along with just one other species (White-eared Hummingbird). Now the Xantus's name comes from its Hungarian discoverer John Xantus (1825-1894), who also discovered Gray Thrasher and Xantus's Murrelet. The hummingbird was named xantusii by George Lawrence but Xantus wasn't happy as he wanted to describe the bird himself. Xantus was actually a fantasist as his letters home and his autobiography claim all sorts of false achievements. Xantus lost his eponymous Murrelet when it was taxonomically split into Scripps's Murrelet (Synthliboramphus scrippsi) and Guadalupe Murrelet (S.hypoleucus) but his Hummingbird still stands. Xantus's Hummingbird is very distinctive with its black-tipped red bill and white eyebrow, but I have never found them to be particularly common or easy to see. Access is now denied to my regular site in southern Baja where they used to visit feeders put up by mobile home owners. The mobile homes were evicted too. I chanced upon two or three in some desert scrub some miles north of my old spot. I managed to find this one resting quietly near some flowers he was defending. My best photo of one to date.

Incidentally, all of the books call it Xantus's Hummingbird, but I have never heard anyone pronounce the final s. So I wonder whether the correct name should be Xantus' Hummingbird? If the final s is not pronounced then it should not be included. Although the books call Ménétries's warbler with 's, named after Edouard Ménétries, yet I have never heard anyone pronounce the final s in the bird name. Unlike eg Pallas's Warbler (after Peter Pallas) where the final s is pronounced.

Tags:   Basilinna xantusii Hylocharis Xantus's Hummingbird Baja Mexico Tim Melling

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Here are some aerial acrobatics of two Goshawks. The top one looks like it is doing a star jump whereas the bottom one is doing a swift turn with wings tucked in. This was actually a tussle between two young females over a breeding territory. Although Goshawks aren't especially rare now with a British population of 620 pairs, they can be frustratingly elusive so getting close photos isn't especially easy. This was taken in the Peak District this spring.

Tags:   Northern Goshawk Goshawks Accipiter gentilis Peak District Tim Melling

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