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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.
This afternoon in the service lane from Brynfield Road to Mary Twill Lane: two dozen approx magpies together. I took photographs inadequate for any purpose, specifically counting.
Female Marsh Harrier hunting over Llanrhidian Marsh this afternoon
What else from yesterday, nothing ‘rare’ but some nice chances? Grey wagtail prob 1stW on the dungheap
Redshank scrapping in Penclawdd Pill
Not all one way!
Yesterday was a lovely day out and so nice to see so many birdwatchers doing their different types of birdwatching. First report from me is from the Crofty dung pile steaming away merrily in the morning cold. 4 Chiffchaffs were present one of which I am now calling ‘other’ Chiffchaff as I am still mystified as to how to be sure of the ‘race’. First picture is of it together with one of ours, second is it alone, third is one of ours closeup and forth is a reminder of the ‘Siberian’ from 2024. I am very interested in the… Read more »
Of course picture addition is challenging for me, that was the old ‘Siberian’ from 2024. This is the new one plus ‘ours’
This if the new one alone
This ‘ours’ in detail, any comments from ringers?
I agree with you from the photos Ian. The ‘tristis’ type bird in the top photo has very white underparts while the bird below it is buffer. The most obvious ones seem to show colder grey tones to the head and mantle with green edging to the coverts and flight feathers. There is a shot of a very obvious one in this blog post
just for information he criteria for “Siberian Chiffchaff” as laid out by BBRC are
103 species seen across Gower today as part of a big day effort by Mark Hipkin and myself. At Whiteford, the female Velvet Scoter was still present near the lighthouse as well as 8 Great Northern Diver and 2 Red-breasted Merganser. There was also a Barnacle Goose with a large group of Brent Geese and a Water Pipit and 2 Jack Snipe on the saltmarsh. At Rhosilli, there were approximately 250 Common Scoter and 3 Red-throated Divers in the bay. From Penclawdd, there were 5 Pink-footed Geese and at least 4 White-fronted Geese with a large flock of Canadas and… Read more »
Dartford Warbler showing well late afternoon on newest section of coastal path between Rotherslade and Limeslade.
Ringtail huning over Llanrhidian Marsh. Winter Blackcaps finally back in the garden, male and female today
Large flock of Siskins feeding on alder on path alongside river Tawe leading to Ffendrod Lake. Treecreeper also seen
Dartford Warbler Limeslade
A few observations over the last few days: Today at Penclawdd I went to see the Russian White-fronted Geese found by James Herbert and watched the family group of 2adults with 4 juveniles fly into the area next to sewage works, where they gave great views. Note this is a different group to the 6 adults I photographed flying down the Loughor on Christmas eve. (NB, there were also 5 Pink-footed Geese with the Greylag flock at Berthlwyd seen by Lukas). 4th Jan: 3 Avocets were roosting at Salthouse Point, along with much larger numbers of waders there than usual,… Read more »
Male Hen Harrier hunting over Ryer’s Down this afternoon at 14.00
At least 160 sanderling at Blackpill at high tide this morning – maybe more, but difficult to keep track of the flock as the birds kept splitting off due to disturbance….Also 130 oystercatcher, 1 redshank, 1 turnstone and 2 ringed plover.
Another 40 oystercatcher, 44 curlew, 2 common gull, 2 mistle thrush, 6 starling on Ashleigh Road playing fields plus a little egret and a dipper on the Cwm Stream.