Just received my much-anticipated copy of the 2020 Essex Bird Report, cataloguing all the key records and status updates from that year.
I always enjoy perusing the section at the back that comprises information on the movements of different individual birds gleaned from sightings (dead or alive) of birds that have previously been ringed as part of the different international bird marking schemes.
Amongst the selection of 2020 records highlighted by compiler David Wilkinson, I find the following of particular interest, whether confirming my past assumptions on how birds move around or illuminating movements that I had not previously been aware of:
Little Egret
Two nestlings ringed at Netherhall were recorded elsewhere in England in July 2020- one in Cheshire, one in Oxfordshire- demonstrating that birds born in Essex are driving further expansion of the species
Another was found wintering in Tenerife in December! I knew some of our egrets flew south for winter but had no idea they might travel this far!
Hen Harrier
A nestling ringed at Dornoch Firth in 2019 was found dead at Pennyhole Fleet in February 2020. Proof that local Hen Harriers are not all continental in origin. Such a great shame to see that one of the very few Scottish youngsters that year was not able to survive a winter in Essex. (According to the Rare Breeding Birds Panel there were only 209 pairs of Hen Harriers confirmed as having bred in the whole of the UK in 2019).
Avocet
Three different nestlings from Essex have been recorded in the Netherlands. (My impression was that it was generally a one-way traffic of Avocets from the continent to England, not the other way round).
Gulls
Though belonging to the same family, the distribution and behaviours of our different gulls vary markedly. Further examples of the varied movements of our wintering Black-headed Gulls were provided by birds seen in Essex also having been recorded in Czech Republic and Switzerland, while two Essex Mediterranean Gull records were of birds ringed in Germany.
Meanwhile, from the far north, come records of Common Gull from Finland and Norway and three records of Great Black-backed Gull, also from Norway.
Further information on the source of Caspian Gulls, a species on the increase as a passage and occasional wintering bird in Essex (and which we hope soon to record around Maldon), has been provided by Essex records of two different birds ringed as nestlings in colonies in Poland.
In contrast to their close cousin the Herring Gull, Lesser Black-backed Gulls often travel far to the south to winter. This was exemplified by records of Suffolk-bred birds that have been seen in Essex and also, according to their sighting history, as far south as Spain, Portugal and even Western Sahara.
Peregrine
A sad casualty was one ringed as a nestling in July 2020 in Finland and then found freshly dead four months later in Southminster, appearing to have collided with a set of wires
Rock Pipit
Further confirmation that the source of Essex wintering Rock Pipits is Scandinavia was provided by the fact that one ringed in Norway has been see at Holland Haven in each year from 2018-2020.
In total 15,104 individual birds of 99 species were ringed in Essex in 2020- an amazing effort by all those involved!
Much fuller details, including a wider selection of interesting records, can be found in the afore-mentioned Essex Birdwatching Society 2020 Report.
Interesting read!