Saturday 17 September 2016

Autumn Pintail

It was always going to be a challenge matching Friday's excitement, but when an eclipse Pintail flew over from DP direction at 08:07, it got me thinking how many August to October birds have we had?

As it happens this bird circled and went back, twice in fact and wasn't seen on the deck until Ricahrd picked it up in the NE corner after 10:00.

So the history is;

Aug:1/25th 1981, female
Sept:1/29th 1986, female
Oct:3/26th 1988, over
Sept:3/10th 1989, over
Oct:1/16th & 17th 1992,
Oct:1/18th 1995
Aug:1/26th 2001, eclipse male Sandford
Oct:1/10th 2004, female BSL, 1/15th, male near green bridge
Aug:1/11th 2005, female Tern scrape, then a female again Sept:1/2nd, 4th, 12 to 18th & 21st. The Oct:1/1st & 23rd, 3/24th, 1 remaining til 29th.
Sept:2/11th 2009, juvs on Sandford, 2/14th Sandford & LFGP, 1/16th & 1/17th. Then Oct;2/17th Lavell's & LFGP
Aug:2/10th 2010, ad females LFGP, then Sept:1/22nd LFGP
Aug:1/21st 2012, f/juv LFGP, then 1/29th LFGP
Oct:4/13th 2013, 2 pairs over car park North
Sept:1/13th 2014, eclipse male LFGP, 3/14th, 2/21st & 2/22nd
Sept:5/9th 2015, f/juvs Sandford, then Oct:2/2nd, 4/3rd also Sandford, then 2/12th LFGP
Aug:1/20th 2016, f/juv LFGP, then 1/17th eclipse male over from DP

I remember seeing the Sept 29th 1986 bird and for a short while there being some question over the origins of a bird at that time of year, but it was soon discovered that Pintail are fairly frequent from late August across the County and our records show this trend continues with even greater regularity.

Like I often do, I have to question where are the records from the 90's? I think they were overlooked.

The Teal count was 65 today, so quite good. Mandarin again, 2 Common Sandpiper, 1 Green was it.


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