26th February

A lovely, bright, sunny day with a brisk but easing SW breeze; the main feature of the day was an excellent count of 576 Skylarks – a new island record count and the first figure of 500+ since the mid 1990’s, there were several flocks of 100+ roaming the island with smaller flocks in virtually every field although there was no obvious visible migration taking place.   Other landbirds included 3 Stonechats – with males at the Obs, the School and Cauldhaim, a Merlin, 8 Meadow Pipits, 2 Song Thrushes, the 5 Chaffinches, 60 Twite, 2 Common Redpolls and 45+ Snow Buntings.

                Also of note were 4 Mute Swans, the Eurasian White-fronted Goose still, 4 Pink-footed Geese (the usual three plus a single which flew out south), 3 Shelduck, 8 Gadwall, the drake Green-winged Teal still on Gretchen, 10 Pintail, 20 Shoveler (the highest count of the year so far), 32 Bar-tailed Godwits and 30 Black-headed Gulls – more and more each day now.

Stonechat

Merlin