The First Good Run Down the West Coast of the Autumn

After a couple of false starts I enjoyed a superb hour down the west coast of Guernsey before work today. At last I managed to find the gull flocks on the beaches and in range for checking. Amongst the c450 LBBGs seen were 27 colour-ringed birds including several adults and two juveniles from the Channel Islands’ most important colony on Burhou, Alderney. I was also very pleased to see Orange 9V a Dutch bird ringed as an adult by Roland-Jan Buijs in 2006 at the large colony at Moerdijk and seen now for the past three autumns on migration through Guernsey. It is remarkable how site faithful some of these adult gulls are on migrations!

Great Black-backed Gulls were thin on the ground today, but amongst the 50 birds seen was a bird from Looe, Island, Cornwall, England (White L:AD0).