Conwy and North Wales 10th November 2015

Conwy and North Wales 10th November 2015

The birding group day out this week was to Llanfairfechan, Conwy and Llanddulas. The weather had been dreadful for several days so we were pushing our luck a bit going to north Wales. Still we gave it a go and we had to endure extrtemely strong winds at our first port of call which was Llanfairfechan. We had to abandon plans to spend much time here but we did get a few birds while we were there before moving on to RSPB Conwy.

At Llanfairfechan the first bird we saw was a Goosander struggling against strong waves and wind. On the freshwater lake just off the prom there was a small group of Red breasted Mergansers as well and some other ducks and wind-blown Mute Swans. On the shore some Gulls roosted and a couple of Curlew flew by near to the prom and also several small groups of Iystercatchers. Some of the group walked up to the bridge spanning the river that opens out into the sea at the prom. There they saw a Dipper but when I looked it had disappeared. It is supposed to be quite reliable for a Dipper, thouugh.

It was very hard to use the scope in the wind but I had a go and couldn’t see anything out at sea so we decided to try further back along the coast but we were going to stop off at RSPB Conwy for a bit. Firecrests had been seen there recently but the weather wasn’t that promising and, in the end, it was poor for small birds.

Conwy was very quiet with no real highlights to mention. There was a smattering of the birds you would expect on the feeders and in the pools. Probably the most interesting scene was on the estuary where a mixed group of Little Egrets and Grey Herons were seemingly all collecting in anticipation of fish passing on the receding tide.

So not one of the better birding days at Conwy but we had a little luck when we moved on to Llanddulaswhere I immediately got sight of a Red-throated diver quite close to the coast and very obviously different from the multitude of Cormorants flying to and fro. After much scouring I managed to discover a couple of Common Scoters rising and falling on the waves. Another nice sight was a flock of Linnets dashing around but by now it was time to head off to Manchester again. The Common Scoters and Red-breasted Mergansers were the only new ticks for the year as we had the amazing sighting of a Red-throated Diver in January at, of all places, Riverside Road on the Wirral.

Bird Sightings : Llanfairfechan

Bird Sightings : RSPB Conwy

Bird Sightings : Llanddulas