A short sea-watch

Yesterday, at Borth, when the rain had finally cleared and visibility was more than 20 feet I had a short sea-watch between 1500 and 1600. Quite a few kittiwakes (100+) were feeding well off-shore with a few gannets and manx shearwaters passing by. A dark phase arctic skua slowly flew north at 1540, attacking and chasing any kittiwake close to it. I have been very suprised by the paucity of skuas this year; with such large numbers of sandwich terns around for well over a month I would have expected a few more.