The Birds of Herefordshire 2015 Herefordshire Ornithological Club Annual Report Jackdaws and Hereford cattle at Much Marcle in March 2015 (Photo: Mick Colquhoun) Editorial This is the 65th annual report of the ‘Birds of Herefordshire’, the Herefordshire Ornithological Club’s (HOC) annual publication for 2015, which I hope you will enjoy reading. During the year a total of 172 species were recorded, summary details and highlights of which are presented in the systematic list section on pages 30 – 98, for which I wish to thank the species authors. An alphabetic index of species is included on pages 146 – 147 to help readers locate individual species information and a gazetteer of place names mentioned in the species accounts is provided on pages 142 – 145. The county list of species (now numbering 281) was boosted by the sighting of a Spotted Sandpiper, a county ‘first’, at Wellington Gravel Pits in May 2015 (see article on pages 28 – 29), and seven other rarities with 20 or fewer previous county records also made an appearance in Herefordshire during the year: Red-crested Pochard, Marsh Harrier, Turnstone, Temminck’s Stint, Red-necked Phalarope, Caspian Gull and Common Redpoll. A tremendous amount of effort has gone into validating the records of rarities on the county list during the past year and the review article on pages 12 – 18 makes enlightening reading and provides a definitive list and dates of sightings for all 94 rarity species with 20 or fewer records. The large increase in the number of bird records received in 2014, compared with previous years, continued in 2015 with a similar 46,000 records being utilised in compiling this annual report. The HOC is grateful to all observers for collecting this extensive dataset that defines the 2015 birding year in Herefordshire. Even more pleasing is the level of detail these records now provide, through the use of BirdTrack, and the increased reporting of breeding evidence in the 2015 year. However, as with all recording systems, there is always scope to strive for further improvement and I would strongly recommend you read the review of ‘Bird recording in Herefordshire’ on pages 105 – 106. The HOC Committee wishes to thank both the County Recorder and the Data Manager for compiling and checking this huge amount of data again this year. It is very pleasing to me as Editor to include such a wide range of review articles and reports in this publication (on pages 107 – 141). The willingness and efforts of all authors involved is gratefully acknowledged and I commend you to read these accounts that cover many aspects of the presence, abundance and behaviour of birds in Herefordshire. There are reviews on ‘The birds of the River Wye between Mordiford and Hampton Bishop’ and ‘The birds of Garway Hill’, as well as detailed articles on ‘Unusual nesting behaviour of House Martins’ and ‘Abnormalities in colouration in birds’ and the usual interesting annual reports on bird ringing, nestbox monitoring and garden birds. Finally, I wish to thank the following: Tony Eveleigh, John Pullen and Nick Smith for their meticulous checking of the species accounts; Mick Colquhoun for sourcing and co-ordinating the illustrative material presented; Gerald Parker for the species drawings and Gerald Wells for proof-reading the final script. Mervyn Davies 1 Herefordshire Ornithological Club Founded 1950 Registered charity No. 1068608 Committee March 2015 – March 2016 President ................................................................................................... John Pullen Vice President ..................................................................................... Gareth Morgan Vice President ........................................................................................ Brian Willder Chairman ................................................................................................ Gerald Wells Vice Chairman ................................................................................. Susanna Grunsell Seretary ...................................................................................................... Tom Weale Treasurer & Membership Secretary ...................................................... Jim Wilkinson Recorder ............................................................................................ Mick Colquhoun Annual Report Editor .......................................................................... Mervyn Davies HOC News Editor ................................................................................... Nicky Davies Meetings Secretary ................................................................................ Gerald Parker Publicity Officer .............................................................................. Susanna Grunsell Other Committee Members ....................................... John Birkinshaw, Dave Coker, Mary Roberts & Chris Robinson ISBN 978-0-9933694-1-4 Copyright © 2017 Herefordshire Ornithological Club www.herefordshirebirds.org Edited by Mervyn Davies Printed by Charlesworth Press (www.charlesworth.com) Front cover: Juvenile Red-necked Phalarope at Brockhall Gravel Pits in September (Photo: Mick Colquhoun) Back cover: A Hoopoe photographed at Whitney-on-Wye in October (Photo: Phil Parsons) 2 Contents Chairman’s report – Gerald Wells …………………….............….................................. 5 Weather summary – John Pullen ……………………….....................................………... 7 Indoor and field meetings …………………………………………....................................... 9 HOC accounts – Jim Wilkinson …………………...................................………………… 10 A definitive list of the birds recorded in Herefordshire –Mick Colquhoun …...... 12 County bird list …………..………………………………………............................................. 19 Accepted rarities ………………………………..………………….......................................... 24 New species 2015 – Paul Downes ………………………………….................................... 28 Systematic list: Introduction ………………………………………………………...................................... 30 Mute Swan to Goosander – Gerald Parker ……………………….......................... 33 Quail to Osprey – Robert Taylor ……………………...……..…............................... 45 Water Rail to Snipe – Espen Quinto-Ashman ………………….......................... 51 Black Tern to Peregrine – Gerald Wells ……………………….............................. 60 Magpie to House Martin – Gareth & Una Morgan …..……………................... 73 Long-tailed Tit to Treecreeper – Tony Eveleigh …………………….................... 79 Wren to Greenland Wheatear – John Pullen ………………………..................... 82 Dunnock to Reed Bunting – Brian Willder ………………………....................... 87 Exotica & escapes – Tony Eveleigh ………………………………................................... 99 List of observers ……………………………………………………........................................ 101 Summer & winter migrants……………………………………….................................... 103 continued overleaf 3 Review articles and reports: Bird recording in Herefordshire – Chris Robinson ………………..................... 105 The birds of the River Wye between Mordiford and Hampton Bishop – Graham Cundall .......................................................................................... 107 The birds of Garway Hill revisited: 2004 and 2014 – John Pullen…............. 116 Unusual nesting behaviour in House Martins – Gerald Wells………......... 119 Abnormalities in colouration in birds – Mick Colquhoun & John Voysey ……. 121 Bird ringing in Herefordshire 2015 – David Coker …………………................ 123 Herefordshire Nestbox Recording Scheme 2015 – Beryl Harding ……...... 135 Garden Birdwatch report 2015 – Ian & Natalie Buttriss ……………….......... 139 Gazetteer of place names ……………………………………………................................ 142 Index to systematic list …………………………………………....................................... 146 Sites of ornithological interest in Herefordshire …………………………............... 148 4 Chairman’s report As your new Chairman, coming to office at the AGM in March 2015, this is my first annual report. So, what did we do and achieve in 2015? It has to be said that we could not expect to aspire to the previous year’s achievement which was the publication of “The Birds of Herefordshire” Atlas; the culmination of many years work by the membership. This demonstrated that we can put together a substantial milestone publication, a benchmark of the status of the county’s birdlife, and it is something that we have to build on in future to maintain current information on the fortunes of the county’s avifauna. To this end, our County Recorder and Data Manager have continued to monitor and resolve issues arising from the Club’s move to using the secure national database ‘BirdTrack’ (run by the British Trust for Ornithology (BTO)) for submission of records. This has not completely replaced paper and spreadsheet records, or website entry of sightings, still preferred by some, but the uploading of these also to BirdTrack enables the Club to contribute county bird observations to the overall national picture, much as we did for the BTO Bird Atlas, 2007 – 2011. Your Editorial Subcommittee, working closely with the County Recorder and Data Manager has in turn made big improvements in the way we collate and present the records in the Annual Report. The reformatted 2014 Annual Report set new standards of presentation for the future and our editorial team is making every effort to minimise the period between the generation of records and publication. Another task with which we are making