Latest Migration News From Caerlaverock
HELLO AGAIN!!
It’s that time again for me to let you guys know what’s happening up here in bonny
Scotland!
Right then, as I always start with the Whooper Swans I am going to continue in this form. As I said in my last ramble, we have put some grain out on the back of the Folly Pond to try and encourage the birds to hang around after dawn. This has worked relatively well and currently we have around 75 Whoopers staying and feeding on this Pond. There is however a down side, that being the swans are so happy on this pond they are not coming across to the 'swan feed' and therefore our 11am and 2pm feeds are currently 'duck feeds'............oh wait......news just in.... there are four Whooper Swans on the feed pond!!! We could have a Wild Swan Feed this afternoon after all!!! I will let you know next time how this is developed.
Barnacle Geese numbers here are very good and yesterday were FANTASTIC!! for viewing thousand of geese. Me and warden Steve, did a count on the reserve yesterday and after a
third time lucky (they kept flying around!!) we managed to get a complete count
at 11,684 which is the highest of the month. For those quite quick to realise,
yes it was the 1st of November yesterday, so it would of been the highest of the month. Numbers have been between 7,500 - 12,000 on a daily basis in the last few weeks, so you will not be disappointed if you come and visit.
Today I felt the urge to count Teal. I know a rather strange this to have an urge for but that’s just me. So I headed on up the Farmhouse Tower and started counting. During my count I got up to around 500 and then came across a Green-Winged Teal. For those who love reading my ramblings on here, you will remember I mentioned this bird the other
day and said we expected to see one, so it wasn’t really a surprise to come across one. For those who don’t read my blog often, firstly shame on you! :) But a Green-winged Teal has a vertical stripe up the breast and not the horizontal strip along its side. It is the American race of Teal and we tend to get one or two annually here at Caerlaverock. This goes to prove that wildfowl migration is still happening here!
I’m now going to move on to some smaller birds now though in the form of passerines (perching birds). On Monday I briefly caught glimpse of a Chiffchaff so I wanted to
have a look whether it was still around so, yesterday whilst taking my usual morning stroll along the Avenue I came across a Chiffchaff in exactly the same place as the day before. These birds should really have started moving south by now so it’s nice to have one still round.
However, better was yet to come!! The Chiffchaff quickly moved along the trees and another warbler caught my eye. A WILLOW WARBLER! Now I know this isn’t a rare bird but I think this is actually my latest ever Willow Warbler, and potentially it could be one of the latest ever records for Dumfries and Galloway!! So that was a great bonus. But........... this wasn’t all!! I thought i saw the Chiffchaff again up to my left so I thought I would have one more look at this bird however, this was not the same chiffchaff as before.
The bird I had in my binoculars was a SCANDINAVIAN CHIFFCHAFF.......................
This race occurs in Scandinavia and northern Russia, and winters from southeastern Europe and northeastern Africa. So as this bird was migrating down it got a little lost and ended up in the trees along the Avenue here at Caerlaverock! Whilst I was watching this bird a Brambling was also calling not too far away, so it seems like we have a little bit of a
Scandinavia fall yesterday here at Caerlaverock.
The Migration continues.......
Mike
