Freshwater West & Castlemartin Range late this afternoon

As the tide was rising, 22 grey plovers were beginning to settle at their regular roost on the rocks at Fresh West. Hopefully their numbers will increase as winter progresses.

Some of the plovers gathering on the rocks prior to roosting

Looking at WeBs count records though, they still have some way to go to reach three figure counts that were often obtained up until winter 2002/2003. The highest WeBs roost count on these rocks was 198 back in January 1998, so they still have some way to go!

Over at the Frainslake/Furzenips area quite a large dark female merlin was hunting along the coast, a kestrel was hunting in Frainslake valley and a fine short-eared owl was hunting an hour before sunset along the edge of blackthorn thickets between Brownslade Farm and the B4319 road.

Redwing numbers appear to have increased again in the general area over the last few days - with small flocks of 50-100 or more noted in a few locations.