Things got off to a brisk start this week, with a brief Black-throated Diver out on the loch. A Green-winged Teal has also joined our now apparently resident American Wigeon. Bonus points for anyone who can pick out another Yank – Ring-necked Duck, maybe? The records show that wildfowl-wise anything is possible at this time of year.
Moving away from the scarcer birds, the big events of the week have come from some rather unexpected sources.
We had an impressive roost of assorted Rooks and Jackdaws out on the beach, with over three thousand flying over the dunes over in under half an hour. The large gulls have had similar ideas, with 700 Herring and Greater Black-backed making for an impressive, and somewhat overlooked, sight. Over the arable patch the flock of small brown things is regularly reaching multiple hundreds, with a few Corn Buntings and rather charming pair of Bullfinches thrown in for good measure. Whooper Swans are back with a vengeance after numbers trailed off for a little while in October. Over three hundred are regularly using the reserve, and there are promising numbers of juveniles in among them. Our Lapwings are forming occasional flocks of up to four hundred, while Curlew numbers are in the hundreds for the first time in a long while. Woodcock are continuing to turn up in unexpected places, as they tend to do at this time of year. As is a persistent female Red-breasted Merganser who has taken a liking to the pools outside the visitor centre.
The Pink-footed Geese continue to move around in big numbers, and they are joined by a persistent 30 or so Barnacle Geese and just two Greenland White-fronted Geese. These surprisingly elegant birds provided nice close views on Thursday morning, which allowed for an impromptu master class on racing White-fronts.
Waxwings continue their apparent attempt at world domination, with St Fergus being their latest port of call.