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Guidelines for Reporting Rarities and Submission of Annual Records
Detailed records of nationally or locally rare species (guidance on these is
here) should be sent to the County Recorder Eddie Hunter (
goweros23@gmail.com) as soon as possible after the sighting. An appropriate description should be provided of the species, your previous experience of it (and similar species), the circumstances and weather conditions in which the sighting occurred and any other pertinent information (such as photos). He will then circulate to the local or national records committee as relevant.
Day to day observations, including of nest sites, flocks of birds and species of local interest, should be collated in the Annual Record Form and sent to Eddie as an email attachment following each calendar year. Receiving these by the end of January is ideal as an early start can then be made on compiling the annual report.
PLEASE NOTE
Please could we ask that detailed locational information that may lead to the disturbance of the nest sites of species listed under Schedule 1 of the Wildlife & Countryside Act (1981) is omitted from any posts. This may otherwise lead to an offence being committed.
Schedule 1 species that regularly breed in the recording area are Dartford warbler, chough, honey buzzard, crossbill, goshawk, kingfisher, hobby, red kite, barn owl, peregrine, little ringed plover and Cetti’s warbler.
An hour later and the Med Gull count is up to 60. Three Gannets over the Mixon Sands, a flock of 8 Shearwater flying up channel. At the pier, the Kittiwake colony is full and busy and on the Middle island a Little Egret was amongst a group of Herring Gulls waiting for the tide to go out again.
47 Med Gulls at Bracelet this morning.
Lovely to confirm a second brood for a pair of Dartford Warblers busily feeding young in a nest on Gower. The visits were incredibly frequent every minute and a half bringing in what looked like white ant eggs? or some kind of larvae , whatever it was they were certainly making the most of the source.
Spotted Flycatcher pair still present at RSPB Cwm Clydach. About 100m up from footbridge, on the left.
Cattle Egret (per Birdguides) on the marsh (associated with horses) at Penclawdd this morning
Swift nest found in Trebanos this morning (new record for Swift Mapper), with behaviour indicating another potentially occupied nest along the main road (Swansea / Pontardawe Road).
Lots of swifts screaming over Langland this evening. All very high, so no indication these are local breeders.
Now 14 Med Gulls at Bracelet.
Port Talbot Dock foreshore (per Darryl Spittle): 42 Curlew, 7 Oystercatcher, 5 Redshank, 3 Common Sandpiper and 46 Mediterranean gull
High tide at Bracelet: a Gannet off shore and 5 Med Gulls on the rocks in the bay, one with a metal ring and a white, coloured ring: not legible at that range.
Having used the road behind Amazon for a few weeks there’s lots of herring and lesser b b gulls nesting on the roofs of the factories today I counted 40+ juvs of both species on open ground there’s probably more to come also 180+ starlings again lots of juvs amongst them ,3 buzzards over jays,magpies green and g s woodpeckers and pied wagtail seen at various times
Our pair of herring gulls has just about reached the end of its third barren breeding season. At 5.00 this evening, the female was on our close-cropped back lawn busily feeding in the grass on flying ants at its feet, clicking its mandibles as it did so. It made one or two snaps in the air, which it may have decided were not an energy-efficient way of feeding. In the next day or two we must see dozens of gulls harvesting ants a hundred feet above us.
Goldcrest nest found on the pavement in Manselfield Road this morning 😍