It has been an interesting winter so far with our birds once they arrived at Slamannan not showing themselves to us in many of their usual feeding sites.
This was thought to be due to disturbance by farming activities in these usual haunts. However for the past few weeks things have settled down and the birds having been showing themselves quite well which is allowing us to view them and identify individuals with neck collars.
At present we have counted a flock total of about 175 birds which is a similar size to recent winters.
Sadly our last working GPS collar (Tag5) (female) stopped working, a while after it appeared to successfully breed with its mate V8 (male). This bird (V8) was seen in Norway during its migration south with 3 juveniles in attendance and is now here at Slamannan along with collar V6 who has a partner and 2 juveniles. Our count of juveniles is continuing at present and we hope to have a better figure by the end of the year.
It has been an interesting autumn (26th November) for Taiga Bean Geese being seen in other areas of Scotland and Ireland. A total of 45 birds have been reported from places like Orkney, Caithness and Ireland. This is very unusual and not been apparent in winters past.
We have not been in a position to catch and ring any birds so far this winter, but we are hopeful that we will be in a position to achieve this by the end of the year.
