Tuesday 13th December

 Weather today a bit milder, damper, breezier and cloudier!

Continuing on from yesterday’s blog about avian flu, Mark Shields reports a definite increase in dead and dying Barnacle Geese at Gruinart since the tail end of last week. Also, a dead Whooper Swan was found on the reserve this morning, which is now being tested by Nature Scot.

However, amidst the gloom, there are still live birds out there and a good one found by Mark a couple of days ago. He read a neck collar on a Greenland White-fronted Goose as J7P and has just received the details back from researcher Tony Fox, who was clearly delighted! He replied: “this is brilliant, such a treat. It was not seen last year, but this is one of the last GWFG caught in Greenland, from summer 2008, so a really special favourite and a real survivor!" Well, lets pray it remains a survivor having managed well for the past 14+ years. Mark comments that these days all the other GWFG that are colour-marked that he knows of are ringed in Scotland/Ireland/Iceland far more recently.

Today’s bird news comes c/o James How.

At Loch Gruinart: 2 Little Egrets, 7 White-tailed Eagles, 1 Merlin.

At Ardnave: 1 Merlin, 4 Purple Sandpipers. 1 Greenshank, 3 Grey Plover.

Finally, David Livingstone kindly sent in this photo of 3 White-tailed Eagles perched up at Bridgend today.

 Many thanks to everyone for their contributions.