Well... Today took a good turn! South-easterlies overnight held promise, we were hoping for a Greenish Warbler or Golden Oriole, perhaps, but instead got something a bit more pink..! With an influx into the UK over the last fortnight, it seemed like it was only a matter of time before Bardsey got a Rose-coloured Starling, and as Steve was wandering across the Narrows, that time came! More of that later in the post...

George was up early, around 4:30 as the conditions were favourable for ringing, it was a reasonable session for the time of year, the highlights being two Spotted Flycatchers, five Great Tits and two Blackcaps, with some juvenile Wrens for good measure (details at the bottom of the post). Sam was up a bit later and went to the Narrows via Ty Pellaf to have a look for waders on Solfach before heading to the East Side at 8:30, the walk didn't yield anything unexpected, though, just the usual Oystercatchers, Wheatears and Stonechats and other breeding species.

One of the Great Tits ringed at the Obs today

Spotted Flycatcher ringed this morning

Sam set off to the East Side with Mari and Emyr at 8:30 to monitor seabirds, including Shags, Fulmars, auks and gulls. The nest counts have now been completed, and a count from the sea will take place in the next few days, too, in order to re-count the ones that can't be seen from the land.

Giving Ernest a wave as he passes by the East Side in his boat today

One thing that has to be done from the land is counting Razorbill chicks at Bae Felen and around Seal Cave. Some sad news, it looks as though the storms a couple of weeks ago had a catastrophic effect on this species this year. Throughout the whole of the Seal Cave boulder scree area, 21 chicks and 12 eggs were counted, the decline is similar to the one at Bae Felen a week or so ago. For context, we'd expect this number to be comfortably ten times that amount... So that was quite sad, it was bizarre to walk around the empty colony, when at the same time last year there were chicks practically everywhere you looked..! Seabirds are generally long-lived, Razorbills, for example, are known to live for 42 years, meaning that they can withstand many unsuccessful breeding seasons like this, it's just one of those things...

Adult Razorbills at Seal Cave

The oldest Razorbill chick found today, this one is practically ready to head out to sea

 There is a small Puffin colony on Bardsey of about 150 pairs, this number seems to steadily increase year on year, 85 burrows were counted today and there are still other sections of the East Side to check.

Sam reading back a Puffin's ring after ringing it

Mari, just before releasing a Puffin. It's easy to be tricked into thinking Puffins will be nice and friendly because of their cute, comical appearance. But these hardy seafarers have a strong bite with a cutting edge to the bill, along with sharp claws for digging burrows! So holding them securely is always well-advised

Several broods of Shags were ringed, some nests contained chicks that were still too small to ring. But six nests, totalling 11 Shag chicks were ringed with darvic rings (plastic rings with large codes on), so hopefully these will generate some interesting recoveries! There are still plenty more to ring in future visits, too.

For whatever reason, this year there doesn't seem to be much plastic in the Shag nests. Today, just this bit of string and a cable-tie (not in a loop) was found. Luckily, nothing too tangly and dangerous.

A brood of Shags after being ringed with darvics, keep an eye out for these and report any colour-ringed birds you see!

Back on the West side, Steve set off at around 7:30 and headed North to see if anything had turned up in the Plantation, a few Spotted Flycatchers were very nice, along with Blackcaps and Whitethroats. The Withies produced the usual stuff such as Sedge Warblers and Blackcaps. Swifts were in the best numbers they have been so far this year today, 20 were recorded today (that's respectable for Bardsey!!), not bad, hopefully there will be more to come. But the Rose-coloured Starling on the Narrows was the obvious stand-out bird. It appeared on a fence post at first at about 10:00, where Steve managed to get a few distant pictures of it before it hopped out of view and was not re-found until around 16:00 by Emma.

The original photo, just before it hopped out of site!

From that point, George had time to get down to the Wetlands/Withies area to look for it with Steve, where it occasionally hopped up on brambles and bushes, but for a such a striking pink and black bird, it was surprisingly easy to lose sight of! But it was staying in the area and making its presence known quite regularly, all good. Sam got back from the East Side at 16:30ish, picked Ela up from the Ty Pellaf and went to find Steve and George who were watching the bird in the Wetlands. At this time it was finally possible to get long, close views, which was great, it really was a good looking male Rose-coloured Starling. Ela has seen some pretty good birds now, Woodchat Shrike, Rosefinch and Rose-coloured Starling by the age of six..!

Rose-coloured Starling, you don't have to be a birder to know that that's a good bird!

George counted 58 Red Admirals over the course of two and a half hours, today. Very respectable and the year high count for this species, every one of them was flying north. Diamondback Moths were yet another species that to had an increase in numbers today, just one had been seen before today, but 14 were recorded by George today. They're not easy to see as they are about a centimetre long, which makes the fact that they are migrants even more amazing!

Diamondback Moth

Blue-tailed Damselfly 

Ringing totals: Great Tit 5, Wren 3, Blackbird 2, Blackcap 2, Spotted Flycatcher 2 --- Shag 12, Razorbill 10, Puffin 1
8 species, 37 new, no re-traps