A Little Auk found swimming close inshore at Trearddur Bay for a few hours last week is an increasingly rare visitor to North Wales. It really is a small auk: at 165g (6.5oz), it is less than half the weight of a Puffin; the now-extinct Great Auk was almost 30 times heavier at 4.8kg (10.5lb). Little Auk colonies are circumpolar, the nearest in northern Iceland and the majority in Russian waters. They feed close to pack ice outside the breeding season, some venturing farther south into the Atlantic that can be pushed into the Irish Sea in stormy conditions. They used to be regular on autumn seawatches in North Wales, the largest count being 176 from Bardsey on 2 October 1981, but the few records in the last decade have been in winter when, tired and struggling to feed, several have been found dead or dying on beaches.

Storm-induced mass deaths of seabirds are known as “wrecks” and it appears that a significant event has unfolded in the Atlantic in recent weeks, victims washed up in southwest Britain, Portugal, Spain and France. It is estimated that 20,000 birds washed up in France alone, perhaps only 10% of the birds affected. Postmortems show all were in poor condition, starving to death. Many of the Puffins, Guillemots and Razorbills may be from breeding colonies in Britain & Ireland. Seabirds are particularly vulnerable to the rapidly-warming climate, of which winter storms are one symptom. RSPB Cymru has called on Welsh Government to implement and fund the recommendations in its recently published Seabird Conservation Strategy. The Little Auk in Trearddur Bay bird was blown inland after a couple of hours, its fate unknown.
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Mild weather brought February migrants to North Wales: a Wheatear on the Great Orme on 27th and Sand Martins at RSPB Cors Ddyga on 28th, where nine Ruff fed among more than 2000 Golden Plovers and 1000 Lapwings. Six Velvet Scoters and a Surf Scoter were off Old Colwyn, the long-staying Lesser Yellowlegs on the Clwyd estuary, and Black Redstarts at Kinmel Bay and briefly at Gogarth on the Great Orme.

The recent influx of European White-fronted Geese into Britain has been unprecedented in modern Welsh ornithology. Last week, 215 of these Russian-breeding waterbirds accompanied Pink-footed Geese and a small group of Barnacle Geese, on the floodplain of the River Dee near Holt. It is the largest flock in North Wales since the 1950s, and the largest anywhere in Wales since 1979. Another 30 were at Shotwick Fields and 68 in the Clwyd Valley south of Bodfari, with six making it as far west at the Glaslyn Valley, alongside six Pink-footed Geese and 51 Whooper Swans.

A dozen Twite feed on Flint Marsh, a diminishing wintering population in North Wales. Around 200 wintered at Flint little over a decade ago, and ringing shows that the Dee estuary held Twite that bred in the Hebrides, Pennines and Eryri’s Nant Ffrancon. Breeding birds are virtually extinct at English and Welsh sites, while those from farther north now tend to stay in Scotland. The unusual English name is derived from its simple “tweet” call, whereas Llinos y Mynydd is more descriptive as the “Mountain Linnet”.

The Beddmanarch Bay/Inland Sea holds up to seven Slavonian Grebes, Long-tailed Duck and Great Northern Divers, while the count of Purple Sandpipers at nearby Trearddur Bay reached 25 last week with a Cattle Egret on the edge of the village. Elsewhere on Anglesey, a couple of Scaup are at Llyn Llygeirian with others in Foryd Bay and Llyn Tegid.

Snow Buntings were at Gronant dunes and Llanddona last week, Lesser Yellowlegs and Water Pipit remain on the Clwyd estuary and a Black Redstart at Kinmel Bay. On the Menai Strait, a Little Gull and two Slavonian Grebes fed off Aber Ogwen, and a Green-winged Teal grazes saltmarsh at Glan-y-môr Elias. The first Swallows were spotted in southwest England and a couple of Sand Martins sneaked past us into northern England in Sunday’s sunshine.

There are a few places left on a free Breeding Bird Survey Introduction & Practice Session in Porthmadog on 15 March, open to anyone involved with, or wishing to adopt a square for the annual BTO/JNCC/RSPB Breeding Bird Survey. Full details on the BTO website.

The sight of a Common Sandpiper, a small wader brown above and white below, is not uncommon alongside rivers and lakes in North Wales in summer. With its bobbing gait, they nest among lakeside rocks, although will use human-made substrates: I know several that laid eggs on the ballast beside railway tracks, the incubating adult getting off briefly when it feels the vibration of an oncoming train. In February, most Common Sandpipers are bobbing alongside rivers in Africa, south of the Sahara, but birders’ sightings collated weekly by the European Bird Census Council suggest that many hundreds, perhaps thousands, are across western European waterbodies.

Around 30-40 Common Sandpipers winter in Wales according to the latest Welsh Ornithological Society bird report, almost always on estuaries. This is a good chunk of a British wintering population of 100 individuals, estimated in a recent paper in the journal British Birds. A couple are on the Clwyd estuary and Menai Strait, with others at RSPB Conwy, Flint Castle and Cemaes in recent weeks.

The first arrivals of our summer visitors are only weeks away if the weather is favourable. Sand Martin sightings have increased with warmer weather in Iberia in recent days, and a Whitethroat was in South Wales at the weekend, perhaps having overwintered closer than the Sahel.​
Winter’s grip in northern Europe is evident in the continued presence of White-fronted Geese: 30 in the Clwyd valley near Bodfari and 25 alongside the Dee at Holt on Monday. From across the Atlantic, the Lesser Yellowlegs remains on the Clwyd estuary, up to three Surf Scoters off Colwyn Bay and smart male Bufflehead on Llyn Coron, drawing admirers from far afield judging by binocular-wearing customers in an Aberffraw café at the weekend. Six Slavonian Grebes were in Beddmanarch Bay and a Long-tailed Duck on the nearby Inland Sea, Yellow-browed Warbler and Firecrest at Morfa Madryn, and a Black Redstart on Kinmel Bay beach.

Widespread snow across Scandinavia and northern Germany last week led thousands of geese to cross the North Sea as their feeding grounds were covered; the Hamburg area saw 40cm of snow, the biggest fall this century. Most numerous were European White-fronted Geese, of which many thousands crossed eastern and northern Britain in a swathe from Fife to Kent. A small proportion made it into North Wales: a handful on the Dee estuary and behind Towyn were dwarfed by 73 near Burwen, the largest count on Anglesey since the mid-1950s, and 42 in the Glaslyn valley, the highest total in Meirionnydd since 1987. Around 30 White-fronted Geese in the Cefni valley were also presumed to be European birds, as the regular flock of Greenland-race geese numbers no more than a dozen.

Elsewhere, eight Barnacle Geese grazing at Warren Farm near Talacre may have a similar origin, as larger flocks occurred in eastern England. 6500 Lapwings and 5000 Golden Plovers making impressive aerial manoeuvres in the Cefni estuary were probably also moved by cold conditions.

Pink-footed Geese are more regular in North Wales, commuting along the Dee Valley at dusk and dawn, but flocks are increasingly regular farther west: 400 at Towyn and 210 over the Cefni valley in recent days.

The Bufflehead at Y Foryd since December was relocated on Anglesey’s Llyn Coron on Monday, while four Cattle Egrets remain at Porth Trwyn Mawr. Morfa Madryn, near Llanfairfechan, continues to host a Yellow-browed Warbler, Firecrest and Green-winged Teal; a male Smew remains on Llyn Alaw and a Lesser Yellowlegs on the Clwyd estuary. Counts of Purple Sandpiper increased to 21 at Cemlyn and 15 at Trearddur Bay; fewer than usual have been seen at Rhos Point this winter, perhaps finding new roosting places on the new sea-defences around Colwyn Bay.

Benign conditions enabled Wetland Bird Survey volunteers to count waterbirds across the region on Sunday, contributing to the 60th International Waterbird Census, a truly global monitoring scheme. My regular patch, the outer Conwy estuary, held 67 Eider ducks, almost seven times the previous highest in over 30 years of WeBS monitoring there. Calm seas also enabled birders to confirm continued presence of up to three Surf Scoters off Old Colwyn/Llanddulas, with four Velvet Scoters here and another 10 off Kinmel Bay, where a Black Redstart winters on the beach.

A male Smew and a couple of Slavonian Grebes on Llyn Alaw, Black-throated Diver off Penrhyn Bay and Lesser Yellowlegs on the Clwyd estuary were among the pick of the other sightings in North Wales. Elsewhere, a Scaup is on Llyn Tegid, and Long-tailed Duck on the Inland Sea, while the wintering Shorelark remained on the Great Orme and Snow Buntings at Gronant. Just outside the region, a White Stork feeds near Llansantffraid-ym-Mechain, north of Welshpool.

Number-crunching by the British Trust for Ornithology, from the effort of bird-ringers at 100 Constant Effort Sites around the UK, provides insights into the breeding success of some of our commonest birds. In contrast to the previous year, 2025’s dry and sunny weather meant that the majority of species nested more successfully than the average of the previous five years. Resident species monitored had a productive season, except for the rapidly-declining Willow Tit and Greenfinch, while all the warblers did well, including those that winter south of the Sahara. Goldfinch, Coal Tit and Blue Tit were especially successful. This is positive news, because the number of adults recorded by ringers was lower for most species. Curiously, numbers of adult Marsh Tits, a Red-listed bird, bucked the trend by increasing. How these results compare to the national picture will be evident when last year’s Breeding Bird Survey results are revealed. More details here.

This weekend, 23-25 January, is the annual Big Garden Birdwatch, when the RSPB asks us to spend an hour recording the birds that land in our gardens. House Sparrow, Blue Tit and Starling were the commonest species in Wales last year, but average counts were more than 10% lower. Sign up at rspb.org.uk/birdwatch.

Days lengthen incrementally and as the new year dawns, nature contemplates the next generation. The shoots of garden daffodils are already emerging and Rooks in the village hang around the remains of last year’s nests, guarding them from other pairs, if not from winter gales yet to blow. Above the Dysynni, the expressive “kronk” of Ravens rings across the valley as a pair fly in close formation, mimicking each other’s moves before one drops away and barrel-rolls above an oakwood whose lichen-crusted limbs twist skyward but canopy twigs never touch. Ravens will lay eggs in the second half of February, so now they reinforce the pair-bond and find broken branches to build up a nest that may have been decades in use, by multiple generations. When their chicks fledge, the oaks will be clothed in green from which Pied Flycatchers and Redstarts sing.

Remarkably, several Pied Flycatchers have been reported in the southern half of Wales in December, including one in Gwent that had been ringed in Meirionnydd’s Artro Valley in spring 2024. A male Ring Ouzel, another summer visitor, fed along a track in the Carneddau on Boxing Day, while a Common Sandpiper on the Clwyd estuary is less surprising: around 20 winter on Welsh coasts.

Arctic air brought geese from the east. European White-fronted Geese were recorded more widely than usual, including a handful in North Wales: one at RSPB Conwy and two each at RSPB Cors Ddyga and on the Clwyd estuary, where 600 Pink-footed Geese feed.
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Surf Scoters remain off Old Colwyn and Black Rock Sands, two Snow Buntings and a Water Pipit at Gronant, and the Great Orme’s Shorelark was refound. A Long-tailed Duck is on the Inland Sea and a Twite was at the entrance to nearby Penrhos Coastal Park, while Scaup were in Foryd Bay and on Shotwick Lake. Black Redstarts were at Kinmel Bay and Tywyn.