Where Have All the Divers Gone? Bird Report for 25/01/21 - 31/01/21

The weather this last week has had a definite wintry feel, there has been a cold bite in the air and it rained on and off for most of the week. Dodging the rain showers (sometimes more successfully than others!), we still managed to get out for our daily exercise and in doing so managed to see some birds as well.

Starting off in the woods, throughout the week we saw 3 Goldcrests, a Great Spotted Woodpecker, a Nuthatch and a Treecreeper. A Roe Deer was also spotted - we haven't seen too many of these in recent weeks. Whilst walking towards and around the Wig we saw one Mistle Thrush and a total of 5 Meadow Pipits (all on the same day). On top of this, we had highest day-counts of 6 Greenfinches, 3 Skylarks and 22 Woodpigeons.

A nuthatch creeps along a tree branch.

Out on Loch Ryan itself, we are still seeing lower numbers of birds than we would expect for the time of year. Some of our highest day-counts include 10 Goldeneyes, 6 Long-tailed Ducks and 18 Red-breasted Mergansers. Divers and grebes especially seem to have vanished: we only saw 5 Slavonian Grebes and 2 Red-throated Divers over the entire week. On top of this, we didn't spot any auks at all last week. Contrary to all of this, Eiders are still being seen in good numbers, with a highest count of 192 during the week.

The 13 Scaup at the Wig (from the previous week) remained but the Shelducks decreased in number to 9 birds. Also in Wig Bay, we counted a maximum of 80 Wigeon in one day. Once again we have records of Teal out in the middle of Loch Ryan and this time there were over 200 of them. Our Pale-bellied Brent Goose flock saw a high of 204 birds grazing on the fields next to the Wig track last week. Another regularly seen goose species (or regularly heard, at least!) - the Pink-footed Goose - was seen in a flock of over 1500 heading for Loch Connell.

A handsome drake scaup.

Later in the week we visited Loch Connell itself, where over 860 Pink-footed Geese were grazing in the fields, along with 124 Canada Geese and approximately 130 Greylag Geese. Around the outskirts of the loch, we counted 2 Herons, 78 Lapwings and a Moorhen. Scattered about in smaller groups out on the water itself were 10 Goosanders, 1 Goldeneye, 30 Mallards, 278 Teals, 4 Tufted Ducks, 180 Wigeon and 7 Herring Gulls.

Gulls were present in much larger numbers at the Scar last week. One day there were over 600 gulls present; roughly 120 were Herring Gulls and the rest were mostly Common Gulls, with a few Black-headed Gulls mixed in. On separate days, there were also high counts of 300 Common Gulls and 4 Great Black-backed Gulls seated on the Scar. The Scar is also a favourite resting place for wader species and last week we had highest day-counts of 2 Bar-tailed Godwits (in fact they were the only 'barwits' we saw all week), 165 Curlews, 7 Redshanks and 43 Turnstones.

All in all, it has been a bit of a quiet week but we shall keep on looking regardless.

[All photographs are taken by and belong to Stephen Grover, please ask for permission if you wish to use them.]