Swallowing hard this Crimbo

[BBREE]

Hi there,
According to a very reliable source the BBC I learn Swallows are nesting this winter as usual at a petrol refinery in Pembrokshire.I find this hard to believe!
I think thay mean resting.The BBC have a lot to answer ffor regarding ornithological details!
At:-
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/wales/south_west/7797141.stm
the offending details.
I know hirundines winter regularly in France including in Brittany in north western France and at present there are good numbers of Rock Martins wintering in southern France wherre there are huge temperature fluctuations between areas such as Pau Uzeres where in 1985 on 4th Decmeber the temperature reached a record 27 degrees celcius a December record for the area! However on December 18th a number of years after at Clermond Ferrand
the temperature fell to minus 26 minus Celcius so there is a potential for temperature fluctuations in southern France of a range of over 50 degrees Celcius! At present in south-eastern France the temperature is averageing 15 degrees celcius! So it is quite mild attracting many birds like over wintering Little Stints, Spotted Eagles, 500 Red-crested Pochards together, good numbers of Spoonbills which are becoming much more numersous across France now breeding in over a dozen locations in big numbers including near Calais at the Marquenterre reserve not far from Dover with Night Heron and I think now Great Egret plus Cattle Egrets which are all set to follow soon in the footsteps of Little Egrets as a futher UK colonist.Soon Spoonbills will become a regular sight in the UK according to colleagues of French authority
at the Lac de Grand Lieu colony near Nantes a capital city of Brittany in north-western France where a new ewtalsd reserve will open a new four million Euro reservee centre in two years time to initiate the public about the residentt nine species of Egrets and Herons where breed at this reserve alongside White Pelican, African Spoonbills and Eurasian Spoonbills which are often accompanied with Glossy Ibis resident here which are expanding north also mixing with the feral thousands of Sacred Ibis which have become a pest species feeding on the millions of Louisiana or Florida Crayfish which are everywhere proving food for all manner of birds and animals here.Whiskered Terns bred here in thousands with Black Terns and the odd pair of White-winged Black Terns as in the Biere reserve of Pierre Constant at Roze near Ile de Fedrun the other side of the Loire estuary where there is a Regional Nature reserve the oldest of over thirty in France created when I was much younger! Here there are three thousand thatched cottages which can sometimes be hired for your specific holiday requirements or you can stay at Bois Joubert gite which has an internet site situated here costing a mere twelve Euros a night for a single room.It is luxirious and has in summer singing Nightingales plus Hoopoes, Golden Orioles, Great Egrets, Purple Herons and much more with the Vilaine estuary nearby a superb birding area and the Foret du Gavre filled with Woodpeckers including Wryneck breeding here alongside Goshawk, Honey Buzzard, Bonellis Warblers,Nightjars and many passerines which can been observed during organised walks run by the LPO at Le Gavre town nearby in the nature centre there.
In soutnern France now Sardinian Warblers are feeding on the good numbers of winter insects.In southern Spain near Tarifa good numbers of hirundines are present even breeding sometimes in winter for real ratherr then according to the dodgy source of the BBC!
Kind regards,
Bertram.E.B.BREE in sunny Jersey.

[MichaelF]

good numbers of Rock Martins wintering in southern France
Sure you don't mean Crag Martin Ptyonoprogne rupestris?

From BWP Concise, Rock Martin P. fuligula isn't listed as a vagrant for any European country, and is scarce even in southern Morocco.

[Colin Key]

I have several records of Barn Swallows nesting in the Algarve in winter. The most recent was two years ago when I found a nest with five fully fledged young in the second week in January. Barn Swallows are relatively common as over-wintering birds here (I believe they are birds from the north, rather then our summer breeders which have decided not to migrate) and in the past couple of years a few House Martins have also remained. In the rather milder eastern Algarve a few Red-rumped Swallows have also been seen recently.

Colin

[BBREE]

Hi there,
I would like to offer a littleapology firstly for any typing errors as
I type rather fast and I am always pushed for time so I sometimes make a few typing errors which I would like to apologise for and even though I am
rather keen on studying hirundines being familiar with all the world species and sub species I sent the error too fast before realising I had put
Rock Martin when I meant Crag Martins as I got a little confused as my main language is French and Norman Jersey French which over a hundred of Jersey
have as sole language being unable to communicate in English at all and thousands of Jersey people use Norman Jersey French as a key language but I prefer to use pure French so I get confused with English bird names sometimes even though I know all the species on the UK list and their names in English I communicate usually using French names so I got a little confused in a hurry which I apologise for being rather sily to make such a terrible mistake.In French we oftern use tow or more names for some species like grand chevalier used to mean chevalier criard which confuses even French locals like my birding colleagues who were watching a Lesser Yellowlegs in Brittany for the last two months using the wrong French name confusing birders in Brittany as we now have been twitching what is a chevalier a pattes jaunes now en masse knowing it is in fact a Lesser Yellowlegs still being twitched there in Brittany now at this minute en masse showing well amongst laarge numbers of interesting birds present so I will try to be more careful uising English bird names in future.In the Bay of Mont St Michel now twenty bruyants de lapon or Lapland Bunting in a flock with Snow Buntings.
Goosander still in Jersey and three hundred Linnets near my home now in Jersey in a mustard field.IN Normandy a wide selection of Geese and at Etang de Careil near St Malo in Departement 35 Ile et Vilaine a nice Lesser Scaup now showing well.Good numbers of Ring-billed Gulls about including a first winter at Roche Torin near Mont St Michel.
Abitot et a la prechaine a Jerri ou le vent d'arrri a soufler des au le mantin.
Fat y un moiou frais aujour'anniet! Bertram.E.B.BREE a Jerri au Golfe Normand-Breton.

[MichaelF]

Merci beaucoup!

[Colin Key]

Hello Bertram,

I admire anyone who contributes to a forum in a language other than their "native tongue" - you do very well indeed, but one problem I have with your posts is that you produce such a "solid block" of text with no paragraphs and very little punctuation. Even with spelling and grammatical errors it would be much easier to read if you broke it up into smaller segments (and allowed the reader to "breathe" between parcels of information).

I have spent a lot of time in the Channel Islands, and Jersey in particular (my Ph.D. thesis was on the geology of the granite-diorite-gabbro complexes of Le Nez Point, Seymour Tower and Elizabeth Castle, and I went on to pursue research on the the geochemistry of similar rocks at Sorel Point), and although I speak a little French I always found the Jersey "Patois" totally unintelligible!!

I miss the islands very much (I have worked on the geology of Guernsey, Alderney and Sark also) - I always wished I could have afforded to live there.

Regards,

Colin :smile:

[BBREE]

Hi there,
I am also interested in studies like geology being involved with the
organisation La Societe Jersiaise and its tongue in cheek offshoot the
'Societe Hedonistique d'Etudes Geologiques de l'Ile de Jersey' or whatever they want to call it! Meetings are regular arranged in the best island restaurants at regular intervals and on the French mainland the object primarily being to
enjoy your dinners eating out at select restaurants at a modest price and secondly to discuss geology!
Also I am involved with the archeology section and paleoethnobotany in particular again we just had a meeting at a top restaurant the Bistro Rocque which was excellent and all our meeting are advertised at the HQ in Pier Road St Helier of the Societe Jersiaise which has ornithology meeting each Thursday fortnight after 20.00 hours upstairs in Pier Road in the HQ and wee have 5,000 members worldwide including in Guernsey where there is a partner organisation the Societe Guernsiaise with specialistss like Smithsonian and NASA top astronomer Jurat Le Fondre who is in touch with top earth scientists here like my colleague in Jersey Ric who invented a great deal of the Space Shuttle technology!
Further details at:-
http://www.societe-jersiaise.org

Meetings open to all visitors interested by asking at reception at Pier Road HQ
of La Societe Jersiaise who are all welcome to join enabling free visits to local museums, newsletters,bulletins and meetings for members including attending dinners!!!
Lunch time lectures are great in particular our history talks which I am involved with.We do trips to the French mainland at cost!

Here in Jersey I just found a dead Little Egret near Seymour slip near a live Black Redstart feeding on seaweed.Also at Queens Valley three Goosanders today and yesterday seen by many birders from the UK including Mr and Mrs Tyveck who are hoping to come back to do more birding in the New Year.Today Bramblings in dozens with hundreds of Chaffinch and Redwing at Queens Valley plus ten or so Siskins near the carpark in alders near St Saviours hospital.
Also Woodpeckers drumming, Tits roving with Chiffchaff and good selection of Gulls.In what has for centurys been regarded as 'Brittany', in north-western France at Trevally near the Loire estuary a resident Long-billed Dowitcher is overwintering.

In the Bay of Mont St Michel twenty or so Lapland Bunting amongst Snow Butings are keeping the Cranes and Ring-billed Gull company.
In the Somme estuary a White-tailed Sea Eagle is fairly resident at Brutelles in particular, since the autumn but it is a juvenile perhaps a bird which was perhaps bred and reared in the Netherlands this summer as they are spreading naturally west.
In La Rocque in Jersey near my home in mustard fields in Rue du Pont near the harbour a flock of three hundred Linnets are bouncing around in the easterly wind.
In Jersey if the wind keeps up we could get some Waxwing moving in this direction across the Continent as in Switzerland detailed below:-
http://www.ornitho.ch/index.php?m_id=30005
In Etang de Careil near St Malo many interesting wildfowl including Ring-necked Duck and Lesser Scaup.
Details at:-
http://www.spectrosciences.com/spip.php?article50
If you join the email group:-
coches-fr@yahoogroupes.fr
or the Ornithos magazine telephone hotline on 0033 (0) 143 06 72 50.
Good regional birdlines like Vendee Loire Atlantique for some nice birds all year round near the south of the Loire estuary such as the marais Breton with in summer breeding Tawny Pipit, Hoopoe, Elegant Tern, Slender-billed Gull,
Stilts, and sixty pairs of Montagus Harrier near the Ecomusee Le Daviaud.
Telephone 0033 (0)2 51 62 07 93
Regional birdlines backed by the LPO and Ornithos magazine a little like BB!
Kind regards,Bertram.E.B.BREE in sunny but beasterly easterly windy!