After the tragedy of bird ‘flu in several of Wales’ seabird colonies last year, it has been a far more successful breeding season, illustrated by gatherings of young terns and gulls. Several fluffy white Gannet chicks occupied nests on Ynys Badrig, off the north Anglesey coast, on Sunday. The thousands of Guillemots have already left their ledges, and just a few young gulls and Cormorants remain to leave, close to fledging. It will be well into September before the young Gannets are ready to fly from this, only the second Welsh gannetry in recorded history.

There were few unusual visitors in North Wales last week: a Black Redstart on Bardsey, Cattle Egret at RSPB Cors Ddyga, Spotted Redshanks at Connah’s Quay nature reserve and a Marsh Harrier over the Great Orme. The first Pink-footed Goose of autumn is on the Dee estuary, but surely it summered somewhere closer than Iceland?

More common birds are clearly moving through, or out. There were double-figure counts of Common Sandpipers at Rhos Point and in the Menai Strait at the weekend, and the rising tide flushed a couple of Snipe from saltmarsh as I walked the Conwy estuary. A passage of Swallows over my village this morning headed southwest with haste, not local breeders feeding. A few days previously, a swirling group of more than a dozen Swifts screamed over the rooftops and gained height, beyond my eyesight. I suspect they’ll already be over France by now.

Cuckoos are even farther head, as they didn’t have to hang around to feed the kids. Five being satellite-tracked by the British Trust for Ornithology have already crossed the Sahara Desert, three on a western coastal route and the others heading out through Italy and now close to the Central African Republic where they’ll spend the winter. 

Scanning Aber Ogwen at the weekend, I counted 24 Greenshanks in just a few minutes, a sure sign that birds are heading south, as suggested by a hedgerow busy with Chiffchaffs. Many were scruffy-looking adults moulting their feathers before they begin their autumn journey.

Mediterranean Gulls have started to appear in ones and twos along the North Wales coast, as they disperse from colonies in southern England and the near-continent. A Wood Sandpiper was found at Gronant on Monday, the summering Ring-necked Duck was again on Llyn Brân, half a dozen Common Scoters were on nearby Llyn Brenig and a Roseate Tern at Cemlyn lagoon over the weekend.

A Ruddy Shelduck on the Clwyd estuary is likely to be one seen recently on Flint Marshes, although its origin is a matter for speculation, as is that of a female Wood Duck near RAF Valley. Owing to their being kept in – and escaping from – wildfowl collections, neither species appears on Category A of the list of wild birds recorded in Wales since 1950, although presumed wild Ruddy Shelducks were seen in the 1890s, including one on the Conwy estuary.

Although I have been birdwatching almost 200 times this year, it’s telling that I haven’t seen a Yellowhammer. Much of my time is spent in northwest Wales, and I know that they hang on in a few places here, and are more abundant farther east. Nonetheless, it is staggering how the yellow bunting that sings “a little bit of bread but not cheese” has disappeared from much of Wales. Numbers have fallen by over 75% since 1995, and it stands on the brink of joining other farmland species that are too scarce to be monitored by the Breeding Bird Survey.

A coalition of nature charities in Wales – RSPB Cymru, Wildlife Trusts Wales and National Trust Cymru – has called on Welsh Government to increase its investment in nature-friendly farming significantly to meet nature restoration targets and reverse declines in birds such as Yellowhammer. They have published independent economic analysis that says increasing investment to £594 million each year is essential to fund Welsh farmers in tackling the nature and climate crisis, and provide a sustainable future for food production.

Europe’s migratory seabirds are gathering as the breeding season ends, before heading to Africa. I was moments too late to see a Little Tern in the Conwy estuary on Sunday morning, a scarce visitor west of the Orme. Its coloured leg-ring suggests that it originated from the breeding colony at Gronant. A couple of Roseate Terns were an excellent record on the Clwyd estuary where roosting Sandwich Terns include some ringed as chicks in Belgium, Northern Ireland and Cumbria. Others were ringed as chicks at Cemlyn lagoon on Anglesey, some just a few weeks ago but some are now adults that were ringed there in 2022 and not reported since. Individuals from that year’s cohort of young have also been seen in France, the Netherlands and Devon in recent weeks.

Mediterranean Gulls show up among Black-headed Gulls in late summer, with moulting birds at Rhos Point and RSPB Conwy. Crossbills and Redstarts on the Great Orme at the weekend were migrating as was a Wood Sandpiper reported from Malltraeth Cob pool. A Quail sang its wispy “wet-my-lips” from a field between Sealand village and the River Dee, the over-summering Ring-necked Duck was on Llyn Brân, Hooded Crows were at RSPB South Stack and the Clwyd estuary, and a Ruddy Shelduck on mudflats off Connah’s Quay nature reserve.

It was great to see and hear dozens of Swallows feeding on insects above fruit-pickers near Llanedwen on Anglesey at the weekend, including a good number of this year’s fledged youngsters with their shorter tail-streamers. Insect-eating birds have had a tough summer with cool temperatures and wet, windy weather. The Wales co-ordinator of the Garden Moth Scheme reports that during April-June, numbers of the 20 commonest species were down, on average, by 65%, and 11 of those were down by 75%.

In western Anglesey at the weekend came the scratchy call of Whitethroats from several hedgerows and patches of scrub. This trans-Saharan migrant has been missing from many of my days out this summer, but while we tend to notice if a familiar bird is absent, it’s harder to assess abundance from memory. Records are important, more so when collected systematically such as through the Breeding Bird Survey, run by the British Trust for Ornithology in association with the RSPB and JNCC.

The BBS shows that Whitethroat numbers dropped by 28% in Wales between 1995 and 2022, in contrast to the UK as a whole. In Scotland, Whitethroat abundance has more than doubled in the same period, while numbers in England increased by 15%.

BBS results for this year won’t be available until next spring, but a crude idea of the state of play is evident from BirdTrack, the online system to which 5.7 million sightings have already been added this year. Occurrence of a species on lists submitted by birdwatchers (known as the reporting rate) gives an idea of how frequently it is encountered. The rate for Whitethroat in Scotland has tracked above the average since mid-May when most Whitethroats arrive, but were 20-30% lower than the Welsh average, and by early July it is more than 50% lower. The deficit is most marked in Anglesey and Gwynedd.
​It’s hard to think why Whitethroats are doing worse in Wales than elsewhere in Britain. Previous fluctuations have caused by lower survival when rains fail south of the Sahara, reducing the abundance of invertebrates in the Sahel region to which many European migrants travel in autumn. But the differences between parts of Britain suggest something on their breeding areas. Let’s hope it is just a blip.

Scarcest sightings at the weekend were a Roseate Tern and Hooded Crow on the Clwyd estuary, both unusual east of the Great Orme. Another Roseate Tern was at Cemlyn, where North Wales Wildlife Trust wardens counted almost 1700 Sandwich Tern and over 300 Black-headed Gull chicks, welcome totals after last year’s bird flu tragedy. A Ruddy Shelduck is off Flint, two Whooper Swans at Porthmadog, and last week’s winds saw Storm Petrels pass Porth Ysgaden and a Sooty Shearwater from a ferry into Holyhead.

Sadly there seem to be fewer Swifts than usual around our village, but it has been a joy to watch a couple of pairs nest in our street. Who needs to watch lacklustre performances at Euro 2024 when you can watch them swoop to the eaves and squeeze through a tiny gap to the rapturous calls of the young. In near-darkness, it disgorges a pellet of insects collected from airspace perhaps many miles away and bound with its own saliva.

My attention was drawn to calls as both Swifts returned to next door’s nest. One bird clung to the fascia while its mate squeezed through the gap. Instead of a muted response, the shriek that followed caused me to grab my binoculars in time to watch the Swift emerge awkwardly from the hole, dragging a House Sparrow behind it!

Swifts have short legs with long claws so they can cling to a cliff or building – the family name Apus is from the Greek “a pous” which means “without a foot”. That sparrow can confirm that a Swift has feet as it was pulled by its wing, screeching, through the gap in the boards. The two birds dropped from gutter level to head height in a second. A House Sparrow is two-thirds the weight of a Swift, which is not designed to carry cargo. I ducked instinctively, at which point the Swift released its firm grip to avoid a crash-landing, and each flew off in a different direction.

Swifts sometimes evict nesting House Sparrows, which start their breeding season before Swifts return from Africa, and there is evidence of House Sparrows destroying Swift eggs. I’ll never quite know what happened here, but the Swifts were not to be messed with.

More than 2500 people have signed a petition calling on Welsh Government to require homes for Swifts to be incorporated into new buildings. RSPB Cymru and North Wales Wildlife Trust hope that it will gain further support during Swift Awareness Week.

Sightings in the last week include a Quail on the Dee estuary near Shotwick, Cattle Egret, Spotted Redshank and Little Ringed Plovers at RSPB Conwy and a Cattle Egret at RSPB Cors Ddyga. Eight Mediterranean Gulls were at Llanbedr, the first Wigeon of autumn at Porthmadog and a Sooty Shearwater was reported past Porth Oer.