Calm uncloudy days with almost no wind proved to be quite good in this time of the year for several species. On nov 13, 8,154 Gannets, 673 Sooty Shearwaters and 92 Pomarine Skuas, as well as several other species, offered very nice views.
Nov 14 was even better, (with most of the passage during the evening: 1,328 Great Shearwaters 1,225 Sooty Shearwaters 11,048 Gannets 319 Mediterranean Gulls 682 Kittiwakes 293 Puffins 170 Razorbills 1 Dovekie 1 Grey Phalarope 88 Great Skuas Etc... Nov 15 also brought good numbers, for example 237 Balearic Shearwaters, but Great and Sooty shearwaters decided not to move by. Only a few were counted. There was also a tiny movement of Grey Plover and increasing groups of Razorbills. Observers: Antonio Sandoval Rey, Ricardo Hevi Barcón, Antonio Martínez Pernas We obtained some footages in order to help you to imagine the seabird movement these days. Enjoy them! As soon as the wind changed seabirds started to move close to the headland some of them in amazing numbers. Gannets, for instance, kept a passage of more than 3,000/h all during all the day on nov 9th, meaning that that day close to 30.000 of them flew by. The following two days were also very good, with c. 2,000/h and 1,200/h. Other nice numbers were: - Over 500/h Sooty Shearwaters on nov 10th. - 138 Pomarine Skuas, 13 Arctic Skuas, 2 Long-tailed Skuas and 103 Bonxies during the three days (in 7,30 hs of census). - 423 Kittiwakes on nov 11th. The best pasage up to now this year. Observers: Ricardo Hevia Barcón and Antonio Martínez Pernas. Calm days at the headland, with East winds a Larks entering from the sea. Not many birds over the waves, but movement of Gannets kept increasing, reaching over 1.000/h. There were also nice numbers of Mediterranean Gulls, with up to 30/h. Other seabirds on the move were Sooties, Balearics, Great Skuas, a few Kittiwakes and Razorbills, some Puffins and Gillemots... Almost all of the Cory's have already abandoned this area. There are only a few young birds left. A group of 16 were feeding close to the fishing boats on Nov. 1st and 2nd. These are some of them: The night of Nov 1st, one young Cory's fell on one of the tables of a cafetería at Porto de Bares (attracted to the lights), and was brought to Antonio Sandoval's home. The following day it was feeded and ringed by the Galician expert in the species, Álbaro Barros (Vigo University) and released at sea by Pablo, a local fisherman and a good friend. Unfortunately, another young was found close to the beach eated by a predator: Most surely these birds belong to yhe tiny colony at Coelleira island, very close to Bares, and the most northerly breeding place known for Cory's in the world.
Observers: Antonio Sandoval Rey, Álvaro Barros López. The 9 hs count from the headland during these two days produced 10.933 Gannets, 969 Sooty Shearwaters and 108 Great Shearwaters, as well as 1 Sabine´s Gull and a few of all the most common seabirds here.
A Short-eared owl arrived from the sea on 25th, as well as Starlings, Meadow Pipits, Redwings and Skylarks. An Eurasian reed warbler originally ringed in the Netherlands was captured in the ringing nets at the reedbed close to the observatory. A Common minke whale was watched close to the headland during the afternoon of 24th. Observers: Antonio Sandoval Rey, Ricardo Hevia Barcón, Pablo Pita.
The Stock Dove (or maybe another one) was still at the headland, as well as the two Godcrests. Land migrants kept arriving during the las hours, including at least Meadow Pipits, Robins, Skylarks, White Wagtails, Black Redstarts, Coal Tits, Blue Tits, Common Chiffchaffs, European Pied Flycatchers, Spotted Flycatcher, Northern Wheatears, Eurasian Reed Warblers and the first groups of Redwings and Fieldfares of the season. A friend from France, Jean Pierre Saint-Andreux, watched early in the morning a Lesser Whitethroat close to the reedbed.
At sea things were quite calm, with a constant passage of Gannets and a few Kittiwakes and Razorbills but not much more, excepto on 18th, when up to 125 Balearic Shearwaters kept most of the morning feeding quite close to te headland in company of Gannets, a few Cory's and 2 Sooties. Observer: Antonio Sandoval Rey Very good numbers of migrants during these days at the headland, with a great fall of Meadow Pipits, Robins (they were everywhere) and Skylarks, as well as groups of Yellow Wagtail, Black Redstart, Coal Tit and Blue Tit, lots of Common Chiffchaffs, a few Willow Warblers and European Pied Flycatchers, one Spotted Flycatcher, some Northern Wheatears and Song Thrushes... The main sightings were a Snow Bunting (first for the season at Galicia) at the beach, a Stock Dove and 2 Goldcrests on 12th. At sea there were thousands o Gannets on the move: 9.471 were counted in 8,25 hs. Also 653 Balearics, 62 Bonxies and 156 Mediterranean Gulls. But only 13 Actic and 17 Pomarine Skuas. By the way, have you ever seen a bird of this kind? The local male Peregrine loves to watch the Headland from there. This last picture shows our Cantabrian friends Jesús Menéndez and Toño Lastra, a good company during the weekend! Observers: Antonio Sandoval, Jesús Menéndez, Toño Lastra, Pablo Gutiérrez, Antonio Gutiérrez, Lucas Gutiérrez, Víctor Rivera, Antonio Martínez Pernas, Ricardo Hevia
Today's 5,30 hs evening count with WNW winds produced some very good numbers:
7,328 Sooties 7,106 Gannets 2,625 Cory's 2 Great Shearwaters 368 Manxies 86 Balearics 60 Pomarine Skuas 15 Arctic Skuas 101 Great Skuas Etc, included the first 3 razorbills of the season. Observers: Antonio Martínez Pernas, Ricardo Hevia Barcón, Javier Cantil and Nick Whitehouse Sergio Paris has sent to this web the photograph of the Merlin (first for the season) found by himself and Isabel García-Rodeja close to the Observatory on oct. 3. Thanks a lot!
Not much seabird passage during these days due to the prevailing NE winds. Instead, we had some nice numbers of migrants, including:
- 2 Lapland Buntings - oct 1 (found by Ricardo Hevia) - 2 Yellow-browed Warblers - oct 3 (found by Ricardo Hevia) - 1 Lesser Witethroad - oct 5 (found by Antonio Martínez Pernas) A Common Gull to the East on oct 6 was the first of the season here. Winds changed on oct 6th, bringing a nice passage of Great Shearwaters (187 in 3,30 h), as well as 1363 Cory's, 15 Pomarines, 1 Sabine's Gull and 5 Grey Phalaropes. Observers: Ricardo Hevia, Antonio Martínez Pernas, Antonio Sandoval, Pablo Gutiérrez, Antonio Gutiérrez, Sergio París, Isabel García-Rodeja, Miguel Maestro, and participants in the Bird's Day organized by Sociedade Galega de Ornitoloxía (www.sgosgo.org). |
Who we areThe main birders at Estaca de Bares cape, in alphabetical order: Archives
Agosto 2021
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