Brown Booby Sula leucogaster South Gare, Septmber 21st 2023

On March 21st 1980 four of us were watching a Brown Booby perched on buoys off the North Beach at Eilat, Israel. A tropical species my only other observation was of an adult and immature at the same locale in March 1992. Warming climate and particularly warming seas have seen a rapid northward push of this and other warm water species with the first British record coming in 2019. More birds quickly followed and this autumn at least two penetrated the North Sea with one lingering off the Yorkshire coast for a few days but my knee op meant I could not get there - fast forward to mid-September and this adult female relocated to the Tees estuary moth being seen daily at South Gare, Yorkshire or Cleveland take your pick. A two hour drive still seemed excessive but eventually on the 21st I haded north with daughter in tow. On a nice but breezy and cool, sunny day the Booby duly perched on its favoured old pier but we had to wait two hours to see it fly. I don't twitch much nowadays hence I am still 8 short of 500 in Britain but this was such a nice bird and gave such great views and we called in to Whitby Abbey on the way home for bonus points.