by Michael Dryden
•
12 Mar, 2024
12.03.2024 The male Pintail was at St Ouen's Pond again today, but still remaining outside camera range, so until it gives itself up to a decent image, here is a previous visitor to the Island ( seen at Queen's valley) MD After yesterday's fine weather, it was back to cloudy and at times wet conditions in a moderate southwest wind. As well as the Pintail at St Ouen's Pond were a Gadwall , 9 Wigeon , 3 Shovelers , 2 Shelduck , 52 Teal , 3 Snipe and late this afternoon, 2 Swallows . Seen at and passing Seymour over this morning's twelve metre tide were 3 Great Northern Divers, 2 Great Crested Grebes , a Slavonian Grebe, 3 Black-necked Grebes , a Common Scoter , 38 Red-breasted Mergansers , 415 Brent Geese , many of which were arriving from the East, 31 Razorbills , 2 Guillemots , 13 Sandwich Terns , 345 Black-headed Gulls, 13 Mediterranean Gulls, 43 Common Gulls, 7 Kittiwakes , and 8 Gannets . On the falling tide, waders flying up included 320 Dunlin , 43 Sanderlings , 2 Ringed Plovers , a Bar-tailed Godwit , 53 Grey Plovers and 32 Turnstones , also 2 Peregrines which were operating offshore. At La Sente were a pair of Shelduck , 100+ Brent Geese , 5 Greenshanks , 44 Redshanks , a Curlew , 35 Cattle Egrets , 12 Little Egrets , 3 Grey Herons and a Marsh Harrier. A Short-eared Owl was a good find in Ronez Quarry at lunchtime, while on Queen's Valley reservoir were a Kingfisher , 2 Teal and 4 Tufted Duck . In St Aubin's Bay, at St Aubin were 41 pale-bellied Brent Geese, 5 dark-bellied Brent Geese and 27 Redshanks and on Beaumont Marsh were 200 dark-bellied Brent Geese , 6 Lesser Black-backed Gulls, 5 Shovelers , 6 Pied Wagtails , a Siskin and a Firecrest . On the cricket field at St Michael's School in St Saviour were 37 Lesser Black-backed Gulls with 70 Herring Gulls, 34 Pied Wagtails and 2 White Wagtails . A Grey Wagtail was on Grands Vaux reservoir. In Valled des Vaux, visiting a garden feeder there were 14 Siskins , 6 Bullfinches and 3 Blackcaps , with 2 Woodcock seen there at last light yesterday. 60 Chaffinches were in Talavera Lane.