Happy New Year - Anglesey Update

I had a rather leisurely bimble around the Island with Tony on the first. There was a Black Guillimot in Holyhead fish quay with 2 in the Harbour. A GND was also in the Harbour and a Chough feeding along the grassy area on the promenade, and a lock of 80 Greenfinches was one of the biggest flocks I've seen recently. In Beddmanarch bay there were upto 3 Slavonian Grebes (on the 29th Tony had a close bird in Cemlyn bay). There were also 85 Grey Plovers on the other side of Beddmanarch bay. At the 4 mile bridge end of the Inland sea we had an adult Med Gull but Mark S had 10 there on the 2nd. We also had a Nordic Jackdaw at 4 Mile Bridge. At Malltraeth there were 5 Blackwits, Greenshank, 100+ Pintail and the feeders at Llyn Parc Mawr were very busy, including a few tame Siskins. A Red Squirrel was nearby. Also on the first Reg and Simon had a Bonxie at Cemlyn, Martin had 2 Whooper Swans there and David W had a Firecrest at Llyn Rhos Ddu. We also had a walk out onto the Malltraeth Salt-marsh. Tony had a Merlin whilst I was doing a Snipe flush, but it took me about 100 Common Snipe before I flushed a single Jack. It would be interesting to do an organised flush as I covered less than a twentieth of the Marsh so I'm sure there would be well over a thousand Snipe around the Salt-marsh. I also had three possible Water pipits flying around the Salt-marsh. There call was slightly less harsh than Rock Pipit and when they dropped back down their outer tail feathers appeared white in the split second as they dropped to earth below the horizon, the only time they weren't silhouetted. I went flying after slipping in the mud, spraying Tony as I went down, so we both left the marsh in a rather mucky state! We did finish the day on a high though as the female Long tailed Duck was showing at the NW end of Llyn Llewenan. On the 2nd me and Tony had 2 Purple Sands, 3 Grey Plover, 40 Turnstones and the over-wintering Whimbrel at Cemlyn. Also in the 2nd  Brian Iddon had 5 Jack Snipe, 5 Brent Geese, Greenshank and Kingfisher in Dulas bay. Yesterday there were 3 GND's on the Inland Sea (Norman), the Hooded Crow seems to be resident in Holyhead Mc Donalds and Martin had a dead Barn Owl 50m out of Llanfacreath towards Cemaes. 3 Short eared Owls were seen at dusk yesterday on the west side of the Alaw Estuary in a rough area viewed from the beach on the edge of Beddmanarch bay. Also the 16 Whooper Swans are still at Malltraeth Marsh RSPB reserve.

Nordic Jackdaw

Whooper at Coron

Whooper, 2 Goosanders and c.200 Tufties were at Coron

Malltraeth Pintail

This freaked me and Tony out a little!

Goose-barnacles

Feeder frenzy

Llewenan Long tailed Duck