Gulls at Appleford 30/11/11

This is the Iceland Gull found by Tom Wickens this morning. These poor video grabs were obtained mid afternoon. The general blotchy look to the scapulars, the sharply defined dark on the bill with a fine pale tip (inset middle pic), the pale iris and the finely marbled tertials indicate a 2nd winter, a rare age class in Oxon.

The bird above is not the regular, classic looking Caspian Gull that has been visiting Appleford over the last few weeks. It is a very odd gull, obviously with cachinnans tendencies but very heavily marked scapulars. The most strange thing was its state of moult. It had second generation tertials, all inner greater coverts and many other wing coverts. It even had a third generation tertial on the left side and one or two third generation greater coverts on both wings. Intriguingly it was carrying a yellow ring on its right leg. It would be good to get the number so the parentage can be confirmed. Gulls have been given yellow rings over the last three years from colonies in Lithuania and Poland; they included Yellow-legged, Caspian and Herring Gulls and their hybrids.

Port Meadow: 30th November

Port Meadow
3 Goosander: 1m 2 r/h.

Adam Hartley

Appleford: Appleford GP: 30th November

Appleford: Appleford GP
Iceland Gull: 1w. Birds from this morning still present. SU522927.
Caspian Gull: 1w. SU522927.

Phil Chapman

Otmoor Tree Sparrows 30th November

Paul Greenaway has just phoned to say that there are two Tree Sparrows on the temporary feeders near the new hide.

Appleford Spit Pit 30th November

Tom Wickens has just called to say that not only is the 1st winter Caspian gull on the Appleford Spit Pit this morning but also there's a 1st winter Iceland gull there.

Farmoor 28th November

Short -eared Owl :  Buckthorn  Meadow

Wolvercote: 28th November

Wolvercote
Raven: Heading SW across to Port Meadow.

J Dexter

Otmoor Great Grey Shrike

RBA are reporting a great grey shrike yesterday at Otmoor at the Firing Range at 2 p.m.

Otmoor 27th November

Female Hen Harrier on Otmoor today (c) Jonathan Mercer

also 5 Short-eared Owls on the reserve

Full weekend round up at  Otmoor Birding

Pit 60

Belated report of a Bittern at Pit 60 last Friday 25th Nov.

Radley 27th November

2 of 4 Crossbills (3m1f) today at Radley at the east end of Bullfield Lake.

(per Mike Flemming)










photo (c) M.Flemming

Beckley: 27th November

Probable Hen Harrier male. Seen, by my non birding wife, flying across B4027.

Nick Suckling

Henley Road GPs: 27th November

Henley Road GPs
Yellow-legged Gull: ad.

Marek Walford

Rushy Common: 27th November

Rushy Common
Peregrine
6 Red-crested Pochard

Simon Bradfield

Appleford 26th November

1st winter Caspian Gull still at Appleford this morning on the Spit Pit.

more photo's here

View only from car.

HD at 720p

More video of this stunner (sorry)

                                

Aston: 23rd November

Aston
4 Grey Partridge: 2 pairs.

J Dexter

Biffaward grant to Otmoor R.S.P.B

Biffaward is a multi-million pound fund that helps to build communities and transform
lives through awarding grants to community and environmental projects across the UK.

Biffaward looks to support site-based projects that protect and enhance biodiversity
across the UK, particularly those concentrating on species and habitats that have been
identified as a priority in Biodiversity Action Plans.

more at Otmoor Birding

Otmoor.A.M. 23rd November.

3 Redpoll
1 Mistle Thrush
2 Snipe
1 Greensand
1 Water Rail

Spam E-mails

Hi all, my Gmail account was hacked last night so some of you may have got a spam mail from me with a dodgy link in it. If so then please just ignore it & delete the message.

I'm sure most of you will already know this but just in case for those who don't, this is rather common for Gmail and Hotmail accounts. If you have one of these accounts and suddenly start getting lots of mail delivery failure messages for spam links then you've been hacked and need to change your password. I don't know about Hotmail but Gmail also has a link at the bottom showing who else is logged on to your account - you can kick them off first and then change the password so they can't get back in. The messages should then stop.

If you ever get an unexpected e-mail from someone with just a dodgy looking link and no message, don't click on it. At the very least e-mail them back to check whether it was genuine.

My apologies for those who already know all this. That is the end of this public information broadcast!