Birding Group Visit to RSPB Conwy, The Spinnies and Cemlyn Bay : 10th June 2014

Birding Group Visit to RSPB Conwy, The Spinnies and Cemlyn Bay : 10th June 2014

On the 10th June the birding group set off on day 1 of the two day outing to Anglesey. We met up at RSPB Conwy and had a quick cup of tea before going round the site. It was a little after high tide when we set out. In truth there wasn’t that much about apart from the usual suspects. One surprising thing was that although it was high tide when we got there, by the time we had walked round to the far side there was quite a lot of mud visible, an interesting reminder of how shallow the water was.

This was the case at also at our next port of call, the Spinnies at Aberogwen near Tal-y-Bont. There were a few Mergansers there and the usual mass of Mute Swans but apart from that it was unspectacular, the nicest thing being views of “crecheing” Shelduck leading little flocks of birds along the shore line. Surprisingly there were no Terns there but this was rectified by our next stop. Cemlyn Bay.

Cemlyn Bay never disappoints. It was windy as usual with strong gusts blasting into our faces as we looked on to the islands in the lagoon. A couple of interesting things were apparent. Firstly, only the Sandwich Terns appeared to have young in the nests as only they were too-ing and fro-ing from the sea to the island in a non-stop commute for fish. They were also almost exclusively on the first, main, island from the northerly part of the bay. The Arctic and Common Terns were all on the other island and they seemed only to be fishing for themselves. This presumably fits with the Sandwich Terns arriving in Britain earlier than the other Terns.

The Sandwich Terns were jammed onto the island with Black-headed Gulls who already had chicks but surprisingly – at least for me – we saw a minimum of four Mediterranean Gulls as well, all together and all at the very back of the island. With a scope and some determination you could eventually see the heads of this many obviously roosting at the very back of the island but there may have been more.

We had plenty of time to look at the Terns before taking a walk over to the headland. There wasn’t much around except the odd Curlew and a couple of Ringed Plovers and Oystercatchers but we had a pretty good time there anyway – Terns never disappoint. It was interesting, as well, how low the Terns flew to the shingle when there were only one or two people about – if there were more they kept much higher up.

A final note; there seemed to be many fewer this year than last and I remember thinking the same last year. I do not know if this is indicative of anything as Terns are liable to change sites quite frequently and do not always breed every year.

Bird Sightings : Cemlyn Bay