Can't help you with your Shag @wild edges but we do see what I have always taken to be cormorants here along the coast.
Different problem here. How reliable is the Merlin app? There is a creature here that makes a strange noise these days as we approach dusk so I set Merlin on it this evening to see if it's a bird or a toad or a frog. The jury is still out but, according to Merlin, we had house sparrow, tree sparrow, robin, chiffchaff - so far so good - but then we got great bittern, spotted flycatcher, little owl and long-tailed tit........... Never seen those but then we are in the middle of the country with loads of hiding places in trees and shrubs but not exactly marshy bits on the doorstep.
Vendée - 20kms from Atlantic coast.
"The price good men (and women) pay for indifference to public affairs is to be ruled by evil men (and women)."
This is bird watching summed up for me. The current rare bird map showing all the interesting birds avoiding Wales like it's got the bird flu.
On my weekend in Devon I spoke to the guy who logged this Wryneck too. He saw it five minutes before I got there I did see a Dartford Warbler though which was good enough for me
If you can keep your head, while those around you are losing theirs, you may not have grasped the seriousness of the situation.
Red stars are 'mega' rare, orange squares are just normal rare and triangles are scarce. I bet that some serious birders are really putting in the miles at the moment to chase this lot.
If you can keep your head, while those around you are losing theirs, you may not have grasped the seriousness of the situation.
October is the peak migration month for a lot of rare birds and I think the recent bad weather blew a few off course. It's also been a great week for migrating insects and there were thousands of Red Admiral butterflies in Devon while I was there.
If you can keep your head, while those around you are losing theirs, you may not have grasped the seriousness of the situation.
I do watch my garden birds, but thats as far as I go, except for the odd raptor we see. But I understand your frustration at missing the Wryneck. I was in Banff Northern Scotland overlooking the sea it was beautiful. A week after we came back you could see the Aurora Borealis from where we stood 🤦♀️ something I would love to see.
My husband nearly trod on this little chap this morning
It was just off the road in our drive, visibly injured but very feisty still. I popped him in a box on top of a heat pas and drove him to a wildlife rehabilitation centre (nearly a hour each way!). Fingers crossed for him, I'll phone tomorrow for an update.
I was shadowing a bat surveyor around some old stone barns last Friday and he was showing me all the bats tucked up in the rafters. There were Lesser Horseshoe bats, Whiskered bats and a maternity roost of Long Eared bats too. Even more surprising because they were all supposed to have headed off to their hibernation sites by now.
If you can keep your head, while those around you are losing theirs, you may not have grasped the seriousness of the situation.
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Different problem here. How reliable is the Merlin app? There is a creature here that makes a strange noise these days as we approach dusk so I set Merlin on it this evening to see if it's a bird or a toad or a frog. The jury is still out but, according to Merlin, we had house sparrow, tree sparrow, robin, chiffchaff - so far so good - but then we got great bittern, spotted flycatcher, little owl and long-tailed tit........... Never seen those but then we are in the middle of the country with loads of hiding places in trees and shrubs but not exactly marshy bits on the doorstep.
P.S. Do they only count if you have a picture?
But I understand your frustration at missing the Wryneck. I was in Banff Northern Scotland overlooking the sea it was beautiful. A week after we came back you could see the Aurora Borealis from where we stood 🤦♀️ something I would love to see.
It was just off the road in our drive, visibly injured but very feisty still. I popped him in a box on top of a heat pas and drove him to a wildlife rehabilitation centre (nearly a hour each way!). Fingers crossed for him, I'll phone tomorrow for an update.