We were sat huddled up against pouring rain and stared forlornly out onto the North Sea which we could barely see. We had come to Musselburgh, just east of Edinburgh to hopefully see a King Eider which had been in the area for several weeks. Unfortunately we had arrived at the worst possible time in the worst possible weather to see anything that lives on the sea. It was low tide, a big mistake not to check that before leaving Wooler, which meant that all birds were half a mile out to sea, and it was so wet that it was becoming very uncomfortable to be there.
Earlier we had left for the hour and a bit drive in initially good sunny conditions but once we hit the higher hills halfway to Edinburgh, the rain had arrived and at times was torrential. The rain relented as we swept down to the coast and it remained dry until we reached the sea wall before pelting down again. Fortunately we had spotted the King Eider, although that had taken a good half hour of squinting through the murk, before the rain set in again, and I had managed to secure some ropey record shots.
This King Eider wasn't really the King either, he was a first summer male and a pretender to the throne, more a Prince than a King. Not like, 'Elvis', the long staying King Eider drake further north that we have seen many times on the Ythan Estuary. Elvis is famous, everybody knows him and we've made the pilgrimage to see him whenever in Scotland in just about every summer since we discovered he was there. Unfortunately he seems to have gone missing this year so the drab looking young bird that we had come to Musselburgh to see would be our only chance at adding King Eider to our year list. At least we'd taken that chance even if views were difficult to obtain. The only time that I've been paid for a photograph was for a shot of 'Elvis' taken in June 2018 when I was lucky enough to grab some flight shots as he sped past us. I was paid the princely sum of fifteen quid by Birdwatch magazine for it!
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| 'Elvis' |
We knew that we needed high tide because we knew that then the Eider flock including the King Eider would return to the mouth of the River Esk and be much closer to observe. I checked the tide times and saw that high tide wouldn't be until four o'clock in the afternoon, over four hours away. We didn't want to wait until then so decided to return to the carpark and count our losses. We had even messed the parking up by driving into the nature reserve carpark via a long and tortuous rough track where we'd have been better served by driving a tank since navigating around the potholes (and worse) was treacherous in our little car. The car park itself was in a very less than salubrious area too and the pile of used drug paraphernalia that we saw by the 'Boating Lake' didn't instil confidence. Luckily there was a warden working on a container nearby so I felt assured enough to leave the car. It was a half mile walk to the nearest point from which the duck could be seen and that walk was ruined by having to share the site with a load of dump trucks that were moving spoil from some seawall works further along the coast. We could, and should, have parked on the road by Musselburgh Racecourse from where access would have been much easier. The King Eider would still have been way out on the estuary though. The day hadn't gone well.
We cut our losses and headed to Haddington, a well thought of town about a dozen miles to the south-east of Musselburgh. Haddington is trendy, full of coffee shops and antique shops (is that an oxymoron), and pretty busy with folk. We were searching out a highly rated cafe, 'The Loft', for lunch which also has a shop that stocks one of our favourite delicacies, 'Lakrid's' chocolate coated liquorice! While we ate our food we perused the latest bird news but there was nothing else of interest and the only local report related to mine that the King Eider was still present. It had also stopped raining and the forecast was now good so we decided that we may as well return the Esk mouth and try again, the tide would be incoming so the Eider flock should be easier to view.
We arrived back at Musselburgh just before half past two, still a couple of hours before high tide, but there should surely be more water and less mud. We parked at the end of the racecourse road and from there it was only a hundred metres walk across a park to reach the mouth of the Esk. When we arrived at the seawall my jaw dropped. Not only was the water lapping up against the bordering rocks but just fifty metres away were about two hundred plus Eider ducks!
Now the ducks were all in a row, so to speak, it was a simple task to pick out the King Eider which was slightly apart from the rest of the flock although still very much part of it. Identifiable by its dark brown back and white breast, as well as the brightly coloured bill, it was swimming in, directly towards us, as if to say, 'Where have you been then?' and 'I'm here aren't I?' At least I could now get some recognisable photos of him.
Compared to the splendour of Elvis, the first year bird was a bit grubby looking and it was hard to fathom that he would grow into such a handsome adult. The 'Ugly Duckling' song came to mind. I'm doing the young King Eider a disservice though because, despite the mottled brown and grey plumage, hints of that fabulous adult plumage to come were still there in the peachy coloured bill. He was still an attractive duck.
The King Eider decided to take a snooze so I cast the net a little further and found a few Goosanders loafing within the Eider flock. I'm fairly sure that, even though they were sporting red-brown heads rather than green, they were male birds in eclipse plumage since the females would be raising young at this time of the year whereas the males, having done their bit, by wooing and then mating with the ladies, were on their summer holidays and doing nothing more exciting than hanging around with their mates at the seaside. The Goosanders, bored with doing very little on the water, then mounted the ledge of the old quay and stood there regarding each other and doing even less. It's a ducks life for sure. Well, for the drakes anyway.
Thankfully not all duck species behave the same way as Goosanders do, and the Eider ducks stick together even when the males are moulting into their eclipse plumage. There were Eider drakes in all stages of moult, some hadn't started changing at all whereas others were only identifiable by their shape. By the antics of the ducks though, much wing flapping and preening was taking place, it was clear that most of them were moulting old feathers out and new ones in. The best part of an Eider colony though can't be conveyed here. It's the noise of the birds 'ooohing' and 'ooeering' towards each other that captivate and it always sounds highly amusing.
There were female Eiders with very young ducklings. Eiders form creche's whereby several females join up, including non-breeding birds, and guard the offspring in one large group. There was maybe as many as fifty ducklings being collectively brought up. The 'ugly duckling' monicker could never be levelled at the cute little fluff balls that are Eider chicks.
Before we left I refound the King Eider which was now very much awake and closer to the bank than it had been. I was treated to some wing flapping by the young pretender and hoped that he'd survive to become the new King of Scotland in the coming years. Maybe we'd see him up at the Ythan in the future!
Year List addition;
225) King Eider
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