Species Account
Extract from Bird Report 2024
Annual and increasing winter visitor and passage migrant. (Red list).
The first was at Myers Farm Potton on 1st January with the next near to Jordans Mill on 6th January. At Thurleigh Airfield a male and female were seen sporadically between 7th January and 24th March, with both present on 14th January, then again on 3rd and 7th March. A male was at Houghton Brook Pools on 9th and 16th January and again on 20th February. An unsexed bird in the Broom East/ Broom South Quarry and Upper Caldecote areas was seen sporadically between 8th and 27th January, with later a female there between 13th March and 29th March, which may have been the same.
Typical records were submitted from a variety of other sites, including a male near Elstow on 21st January, one over Putnoe on 30th January, one at Old Warden on 1st February, one at Begwary on 19th February, a female at Strawberry Hill Farm on 28th February and one near Wilden on 29th March. In April, one was at Sandy Smith NR on the 9th and one was at Potton on the 11th. One at Willington Lock Quarry and a female near Cotton End, both on 12th April, may have been the same individual.
The first of the autumn was one at Broom crossroads on 2nd September, with possibly the same being seen at Broom East and Broom South Quarry on 9th September. A female at Standalone Farm, near Potton on 18th September was seen again nearby at Tithe Farm on 20th September. In October, a female was in the vicinity of Sharpenhoe Clappers on the 12th, males were at Broom South Quarry on the 22nd and 27th and Thurleigh Airfield also on the 27th, a female was at Broom East again on the 27th, and a juvenile male went high over The Pinnacle on the 30th. One was at Thurleigh Airfield on 17th November, with then one at Vinegar Hill, Hatch on 22nd December, with the last, presumably the same, at Brook End, Hatch on 26th December.
