Common Gull on R. Taff at Hamadryad Park. Also amazingly a pair of summer plumage GC Grebes nest building in the lagoon.

At the Bay Wetland Reserve, drake Lesser Scaup present [all ducks at far end viewed from boardwalk] – couldn’t see the hybrid but no ‘scope. 2 Linnet and 2 fem Reed Bunts feeding on the grass. Forgot to say, nice to meet Mike O’Leary from Abertysswg – hope you got better views of the Lsr Scaup from the boardwalk Mike.

In the west paddocks a mixed flock of Redwing and Fieldfare totalling around 100, Redwing outnumbering the FF, plus about 6 Mistle Thrush with them. A single Snipe visible in the Snipe ‘paddock’ behind the dragonfly pond. No sign of Marsh Tit by the dragon tree in Cogan Wood, but Nuthatch there. On W lake 3 Wigeon, 8 Gadwall and in total on both lakes around 150-200 Tufted, ~30 Pochard, and 4 G C Grebe. Ad Yellow-legged Gull and the usual v pale imm Herring Gull middle of E lake.

An ad male and a female Black Redstart on the roofs at Plas Taliesin this morning. A 2nd yr Med Gull with some black spots in the primaries was around the entrance to the outer harbour of the Barrage, by Penarth Head. There were 2 ad GBB Gulls on the harbour wall there. North end of the barrage had 5 Rock Pipit, 1 Meadow Pipit and about 6 Pied Wags.  Didn’t go far enough round to look for the GND.

The Glaucous was still at Sker this morning on the rocks at the point [per DCB], but there has been no sign of the bird at Cosmeston all morning, until 12:30 at least. Just the aberrant Herring Gull there of interest.

There is a local midweek field trip to Cosmeston & Cardiff Bay next Weds, 21st Jan. I will be on holiday so if you are interested please contact Alan Rosney who has kindly agreed to lead it. Tel 01443 841555, 07906558489, or alanrosney at gmail.com.

Went back later and got some shots – bird still totally knackered – hope it survives.

At the end of a v cold, sometimes wet, and windy dog walk, this was a nice surprise when I got back to the swan area by E lake. [digiphoned pic]. 2nd cal yr Glaucous Gull

Quick shufty this morning revealed 21 Little Grebe in the river there. Meant to go to Hamadryad Park but impossible to park round by the old Hamadryad hospital/Clarence Embanment – whole road chock-a-block with commuters’ cars, as was Windsor Esplanade. No cash with me for St David’s Hotel car park. {commuters’ apostrophe corrected after chastisement from Dave Bush 🙂 }

before the rain. 1 AdW Med Gull [ta to Lol Middleton for the call], 1 Ad Yellow-legged Gull, and 1 Common Gull amongst the Herrings, Lesser B-b’s, and Black-headeds.

Decided to have a go for the Hawfinches despite the wind. Nothing doing by the white cottage but walking along the bridal path in the wood a flock flew up from low down [no doubt sheltering] and headed down valley. They eventually came back and flitted around in the tree tops up towards the top road. I reckon the flock was about 20 strong. Managed a couple of heavily cropped record shots in appalling conditions [trees shaking around and buffeting me]:

from Facebook – 1 Brambling in Chaffinch flock this arvo.

Just another quick reminder – the first indoor meeting of 2015 is TODAY [Tues] 7:45 P.M. KNNR. Member’s Own – a sort of ‘bring and show’, where members can do short 20 min talks on a  topic of their choosing. I’m doing a 20 min Powerpoint on highlights of 3 visits to Extremadura. Do come along.

At 3:30 p.m. the GN Diver was right over by the barrage, seen from Ice Rink car park looking towards the southern half of the barrage.

In CBWR Lesser Scaup seen at around 4 p.m. and what must have been the hybrid just glimpsed skulking off into the reed ‘island’ – thought I had briefly seen a Gtr Scaup at the time, but it must have been the hybrid bird. Also 1 drake Pochard with the 50 or so Tufties. A good number of starlings flew in to roost but not enough to constitute a proper murmuration.

70+ Tufties and 27 Pochard W lake. Also 8 Gadwall and 4 Teal. No sign of Pintail. 1 Green’Pecker. 6 Bullfinch [4m 2f] 3 nr dragonfly pond and 3 in conservation scrub area, 40+ Redwing and 10+ Fieldfare [again nr dragonfly pond], 2 Common Gulls W lake, 4 Cormorant, 1 GC Grebe and 1 Little Grebe, 1 very showy Water Rail by the cafe end of the boardwalk [prob the one that Andy Burns got some shots of t’other day].

G N Diver has been reported again in Cardiff Bay this morning, and the Lesser Scaup.

At least 17 Hawfinch at Fforestganol this morning; 2 Bittern Kenfig Pool south, and 2 Sibe Chiffchaff north pool; Bittern at Forest Farm; Spotted Redshank, 2 Greenshank and 8 Jack Snipe at Penclawdd; L-t Duck off Crymlyn Burrows; Jack Snipe at Morfa Tip.

12 Brent Geese were at the mouth of the R. Thaw at least 6 of which appeared to be pale-bellied birds – tide was out so birds distant and only had binos. 5 Little Grebe on the lagoon, a couple of Shelduck on the beach, couldn’t find any Snipe on the lagoon islands. Single Curlew and a few Oycs were the only waders.

2 Redshank on the rocky bay shoreline, only 1 Turnstone, and 1 Grey Wag. Only 1 Common Gull with all the Black-headed on the internal jetty. 1 GBB Gull on the yacht club jetties and 1 by the outer harbour. Saw one rooftop Black Redstart on the way back to the car.

230 Tufted Duck [nearly all W lake], 27 Pochard [all W lake], 2 Little Grebe, 1 Heron, and just single Redwing and Fieldfare by dragonfly pond, plus millions of people!

Happy boxing day all. I have already had some spreadsheets of 2014 records sent in. If you use the formatted spreadsheet that I send out or from the web site, please could you not leave blank rows in your list of records. I have to go through and delete them all otherwise they prevent proper sorting of the data, and also please could you make sure the species name, and your name, is entered in every row pertaining to it, again otherwise I have to go through the whole list and copy the info down the column of cells below, where it is missing, again otherwise the records can’t be sorted properly.

PS … and also the site name shd be entered every time where there’s a number of consecutive rows for a number of records.

from Twitter feed – it appears a Bittern has been seen at Cosmeston – either today or yesterday.