Visitor from Iceland

This week at WOW we had a lot of interesting events, not all bird related. First the heavy rain showers gave some spectacular rainbows.

Then we watched a ship head off down the Lagan loaded up with wind turbines from the site next door. This is a specialised vessel called the A2SEA Installer which transports and "plants" wind turbines. The four large rusty poles go into the seabed and lift the ship up above the sea. The cranes then lower the turbines into place. It is an unusual sight and sound so the waders and ducks all spooked and lifted. If you want more info on the operation use this link

http://www.a2sea.com/fleet/sea-installer/

Next Phyllis and Kenneth noticed a colour ringed black-tailed godwit which has been seen before here and elsewhere as we had a record of it in the file. The attached photo of the log shows that it is 9 years old and was ringed in Iceland. It has wandered around a fair bit but has not been seen since 2013 until it was spotted twice this week. It has not beeen spotted in Iceland again, only in its wintering areas

Not only is the bird 9 years old, so are the flags on its legs! They have endured all the flying miles and feeding in wet lagoons and are still hanging on in there. It was nice to be able to contribute to a little bit of scientific research as humble volunteers.

Finally the water levelels are rising as a result of the recent rain and the ducks were feeding outside the observation room for a change.

Pair of teal

Pair of wigeon

Pair of shoveler

The lists are updated with a willow tit in Bolton. The local patch, Elton Reservoir now has feeders maintained by the local patch watchers, so they gave up willow tit and nuthatch. I will be back in the new year!!  I went looking for divers off Carnalea, but sometimes you get lucky, I turned up three common scoter. I still have 6 weeks to turn up a diver or a grebe.

WOW patch list:    
101 Razorbill
 
West Bangor patch list:
70 Common scoter
 
2016 list
190 Willow tit