Learn some birdsongs before the spring rush

Black-necked Grebe (Martin Jones)

How good to be out in the sunshine at the weekend, with Wood Anemones bursting into flower and our resident birds into song. If you’ve promised yourself that you’ll improve your birdsong knowledge, now is the time to do it. Our resident songsters have control of the airwaves for a few weeks before most summer warblers arrive from Africa. There are some good smartphone apps that can help, but don’t assume that they are always correct with their identifications. Much better to get help from the experts, and BTO Cymru is the place to go. In April, they have organised Bird Identification training events at Morfa Aber, near Bangor, and Alyn Waters Country Park, near Wrexham, and two online refresher sessions on bird songs and calls for BTO surveys. Visit their website for details and to book.

The first wave of summer migrants is already here. The disyllabic song of Chiffchaffs seems to be everywhere and Sand Martins have been at several wetlands across the region. A Sandwich Tern was in Pwllheli harbour on Thursday, the first Wheatears at South Stack and the Great Orme on Friday, and Swallows over Bardsey on Friday and RSPB Conwy on Saturday. A Ring Ouzel was on the Great Orme at the weekend, and others may already have arrived on breeding territories in Eryri.

I enjoy hearing the dawn chorus through the bathroom window, picking out Wren, Great Tit and Dunnock, but the highlight has been the chirrup of House Sparrows, a species doing rather better in Wales than elsewhere in the UK. I first heard them, distantly, from the garden during the 2020 spring lockdown, when there was barely any traffic noise with which to compete. Each year they have moved slightly farther into the village and now they have arrived in our garden.

Scarcer visitors to North Wales this week include a Black-necked Grebe, in smart black-and-yellow breeding plumage with a scarlet eye, has been with up to eight Slavonian Grebes in Anglesey’s Beddmanarch Bay. Four Cattle Egrets were at nearby Valley over the weekend, Black Redstarts at Penmon Point and 10 Mediterranean Gulls are at Portmadog’s Llyn Bach. Wintering Surf Scoters remain at Llanddulas, but will soon leave with the seaduck flock.