Whooper Swans

 Family of six look like they're firmly esconsed in the field above Sandyhaven chapel. Two weeks now.

Another Black Redstart

Black redstart, Johnston.  Sunday pm.    Dave Butler 

Black Redstarts

Hello, on Thursday a Black Redstart at The Hookses, Dale airfield and also one at the cottages at St Anne's Head.

Mike Duckham.

Other news

Some excellent birds reported on other platforms include. The Pallid harrier briefly at the Dowrog on Friday, a Pallid swift at Carreg wastad, Goodwick, same day. Pallas warbler and Dusky warbler, both Porthclais on Saturday by Steve Jones and George Mee. 3 Glossy ibis, by Lisa in the feld above Mullock bridge on Saturday.

North Pembs

Two Snow Bunting over Foel Eryr and a female Scaup on Rosebush res this morning. (Den Vaughan)

Three new Firecrests on the Teifi Marshes this morning...also 3 adult Whooper Swans and 9 Goosander on the river..

Dale

A good look around the airfield, dozen or so blackbird on the track up, a few chaffinch, a chiffchaff, a blackcap and goldcrests. 110 lapwing in the old potato field did a fly around. Flocks of starling collectively numbered around 1,000. Lots of pipit, skylark and a mixed flock of 75 linnet and goldfinch. Only 7 snipe on a walk through the inner triangle. A swallow at Marloes Sands end. No sign of Lisa's ibis at Mullock, bumped into Andy B who informed me they'd flown northwards. I wandered up the road back towards the Slate Mill to get a view of the fields towards St Brides, 100 wood pigeon, small flock of redwing, 2 red kite, 5 jays and 2 mistle thrush passing down the valley. Back for a look up Mullock marsh, chiffchaff in the reeds by Crabhall, but quiet until a young peregrine flushed the spotted redshank from one of the creeks.

WeBS Castlemartin Corse

Thanks to Richard for joining me and to Adam who contributed to the count when we happened to be in the hide at the same time as each other.

The recent rain means a nice lot of water currently present on the Corse. I wonder how well the water will hold this winter after recent required drainage work. Most of the birds counted were from upper corse farmland section. 

We had a flock of 548 lapwing which later started to move from upper corse to feeding on the fields opposite the hide. A small flock of 38 Golden Plover were also present. We recorded 5 Curlew, 3 from upper corse and 2 over hide area. A flock of 24 Graylag and a little egret was also present on upper corse.

We had 160 Black Headed gulls on the upper corse along with a handful of Lesser Black Back and Herring Gull to finish the gull species off.

As for ducks we totalled 92 Mallard, 17 Shoveller, 29 Wigeon, 43 Teal and 4 Pintail. 

The 2 Grey herons and a lone Moorhen were added when we met Adam.

Think the highlight again was the female Kingfisher who kindly flew about in front of hide but she then flew to a fence post a little too far away for an image.

As Richard and I started to walk back a sparrowhawk flew past us which was the first raptor of the day. 

I walked the ‘snipe’ field which added to the at that time single figure count to total 49 birds. On the way back across the field I picked up on a kestrel which was hovering over adjacent field. 

The Marsh Harriers decided to be shy today and did not make the count but know there were 2 there a week ago. No water rail were heard today, yet there were a few shouting at each other from within the reeds last time I was there! 

WEBS at the Gann

Nothing particulalry exciting apart from two Bar-tailed Godwits, but the whole area was simply hopping with assorted pipits and wagtails. Nice to see so many small birds about. 

Rosemary Royle 

Male pochard at Penberi

 A male pochard was a nice surprise at Penberi earlier this morning. 

Ring-tail hen harrier and 3 jack snipe were the highlights of an early WeBS on Dowrog

Bird sighting - Black Redstart?

From Andy Thorp: Not sure if this is of interest but spotted an unusual bird in my back garden in Pembroke. Robin sized but no red breast, orange/red tail when it flew. Was feeding on insects in the underside of an outside seat canopy i think. Difficult to get a decent picture but got these two. Looked online to identify and sounded very much like a black redstart.

Porth Sele on Thursday

From Roger Wilkinson: Obviously the birds were as relieved as the rest of us to have a day without persistent rain.  In the hour after dawn there was a constant flow of Chaffinch (460 counted), Skylark (170) and Starlings (very roughly 3000) heading W/SW through Porth Sele. Many Starlings also in the fields. 

Single Merlin and SEO along St John's Head towards St Justinian.

Photo for atmospheric value rather than technical merit

Whooper Swans - Mullock Marsh

 7 Whooper Swans on a flooded marsh at dusk today. 

Marloes peninsula

Like a few others, I had a mooch around Marloes peninsula this afternoon between 2pm and 4:30pm to check some of the fields. Beautiful calm and unexpectedly mild afternoon. 30 lapwing on the mere but nothing unusual with them, the mere looks great at the moment. A couple of good looking fields and scrapes that were created earlier in the year down towards Martin's Haven but just corvids and increasing numbers of starling, biggest flock c 2,000 birds had caught the attention of a merlin.

Skokholm

The Killdeer has been between here and Skomer, last heard over here at just after 16:00. Also Black Redstart and a small fall of Chiffchaff and Blackcap. A Crimson Speckled was near North Pond. 

Black Redstart

.. on the roof of the church at St Brides.

All the best,

Mike Duckham

Skokholm

A Killdeer arrived to North Pond at 15:30 this afternoon. It was still there at dusk. A boat currently looks unlikely. 

Brambling

 A male Brambling arrived in Boncath this afternoon. Siskin numbers starting to build too

Dowrog Sunday. 2nd November. Breezy from the west, with good light until later.

We arrived, around 5 pm and parked up on the track just off the road. The resident Kestrel was showing well as it searched the moor from easdt to west. I love the colours of the Dowrog under a lowering sun it is a truly magical place in the autumn/winter.A little while later  a Peregrine passed by heading SW.  Next, what i took to be a juvenile  Sparrowhawk shot across the moor and landed on a roadside fencepost about twenty yards away to my left.

I have been birding for fifty odd years, would have bet a large sum of money that I could identify any native British  bird of prey with ease had I a decent view, but this one flummoxed me. It was a pretty good  prolonged  view.  What really stood out was the pure white underside,/breast/throat marked with heavy black teardrop blotches, not the light barring of a typical Sparrowhawk. The primaries almost extended to the tip of its tail, but even more curious was the fact that it appeared to have dark eyes set in a black mask with just a hint of a white supercillum above. Juvenile Hobby almost fits the bill (excuse pun) though i would have expected a tad more primary projection and more obvious mustachial streaks and anyhow early November seems a bit late. It was incredibly tame as i got out of the car, paying me no heed, nor of a car passing just a few feet away from it.  

After a few  minutes it shot off across the road on a low level run where it had a go at a small passerine probably a Pippit which it flung up to catch, but just missed, continueing on its way, and away! 

A week or so ago, I had a similar /closer view of a 1st summer Musket (male Sparrowhawk) at the same place and that was obviously a Spar'  staring at me with its bright yellow eyes.  I am pretty sure having looked through books etc this must have been a juvenile Sparrowhawk but the seemingly dark eye still irks me.  Maybe its that my eyes are not what they used to be!

The light was beginning to fade when I was scanning out to the SW and a large raptor appeared to be coming my way. It soon became apparent that it was a ringtail and quite a dark one, (perhaps one another birder i did not know had mentioned a couple of days previously). It kept on coming with  deliberate wingbeats at about fifty feet as if on a mission rather than hunting. It passed on by, and over the willow carr and then I noticed a smaller Harrier convergeing on it from the north west. The smaller harrier then dropped down and i saw it was a pale bird, eg a male, meanwhile another harrier a slightly smaller ringtail  approached the the first ringtail  which then turned and a started heading back towards the moor.followed by the second ringtail.

The male bird by now had come back over the willow carr and was hunting low over the moor in front of the carr. From its broad black wingtips i am pretty sure it was a Hen Harrier which were obvious despite the waining light. It was then briefly joined by the two ringtails. The male still showed quite well but the in the dying light it was difficult to keep a track on the ringtails and i lost the smaller one which had probably gone down. The larger ringtail sort of associated with the male for a minute or two before plonking down in the reeds in front of a wooden gatepost. The male continued hunting, droppuing down possibly on some small prey item where it remained for a couple of minutes before coming back up, and flying slowly towards the gate post where the big ringtail had gone down in the reeds. After a short while quartering the area, he also dropped down, presumably to roost, as the light was fast fading.. I hung around for another few minutes but it was by then, properly getting dark.

All in all, a wonderful hour of Raptor watching, sadly i had no camera with me, this image is from a couple of years ago!

Whooper swans

 Back at Sandy Haven  this morning at  7:15 after  a two day absence- bang in the middle of the avian influenza zone.

Firecrests

A good early autumn passage of Firecrests maybe a few will winter..

    With two more new Firecrests on the Teifi Marshes this morning - 6 different birds since the end of September and  November is usually our peak month for arrivals... 

(Teifi RG)

White-fronted Goose - Marloes Mere

 Went down to Marloes Mere today looking for harriers - no luck.

As we were walking back from the hide this  "Greenland" White-fronted Goose landed on the mere. 

(Tommy Evans)

Llys-y-fran

I checked the gull roost this evening, nothing unusual apart from an apparent lack of Yellow-legged gulls this autumn, just a single adult tonight, there were none on the last visit a couple of weeks back, in recent years they seem to average around 4-5 on most visits. 

Arriving at 3:30pm the roost looked like it might form on the upper section of the reservoir so I walked up beyond the first inlet but by 4:45pm barely 2,000 LBBs had arrived and I decided to call it a night and head back. I hadn't got far when gulls began to arrive from the east and in big numbers with some others coming over the dam from the south. Setting up the scope on the north side of the inlet between 5pm and 5:15pm I counted 9,200 LBB with more out of sight at the very top of the reservoir. I've estimated something close to this previously but as far as I recall this is probably the largest count of LBBs I've made.

Other gulls counted before 4:30pm, 900 BH gulls, 10 Common gull, 4 GBBs (3 adult and a 1w), single adult Mediterranean, single adult YLG. Also 3 GC grebe, 2 heron, 2 Little grebe. No geese seen tonight.

Snow Bunting

At Parrog on wall by the cafe a single smart looking snow bunting this afternoon.  Pecking around for food and we were stood within six feet of it.  Completely unphased by our presence.

Helen Grimes

Ringed Herring Gull.

 In my Neyland garden this morning.Blue ring CO74.Believe it may have been ringed on Caldey.