Trip reports

Caerhun and Aber Ogwen

Saturday, 29 November 2008

On a very cold and foggy Saturday in November, we set off to hunt for hawfinch and kingfisher in N. Wales. It was so foggy in Cheshire that some people cried off from the trip - but Peter (who replaced Rob Adams as leader of the trip) assured me on the morning that the weather was brilliant in his neck of woods, so not to be put off - and so it turned out. Once out of the Cheshire flatlands, we emerged into brilliant blue skies and a very picturesque frosted landscape.

Caerhun is on the western side of the Conway valley near Ty'n-y-Groes. It is the site of a Roman fortress, which was midway between the forts at Deva (Chester) and Segontium (Caernarfon). You can clearly see the raised area which is the site of the ramparts of the fort.

We parked in the churchyard of St Mary's, a picturesque church dating from 13th century AD. Unfortunately, the church was shut. However, there were beautiful views from the churchyard, looking down to the river Conway and also across to woods on the higher ground. These woods, it was rumoured, were the haunt of hawfinches, but alas on that day they did not show themselves.

Plenty of chaffinches were seen in, or flying between, the trees, along with greenfinch, raven and redwing; there were heron and pheasant in the fields and a kestrel was sighted. Looking down towards the river, we saw a flock of lapwing, and a flying curlew, while on the river itself were Canada and greylag geese, little grebe, cormorant and a suspected goldeneye.

We then moved to the bridge over the Conway at Tal-y-Cafn, where for several minutes we had a good view of a common sandpiper feeding at the margin of the river. We then took to our cars again and drove to the pier at Llanfairfechan, where we joined other bird-watchers. One of these alerted us to a velvet scoter, far out to sea and only visible through the scope. In the same way, we also sighted a red-throated diver, which was in view for a long time, as it made its way across the bay.

In the near distance, on the bay and plainly visible, were a number of great-crested grebes. Well camouflaged in the nearby rocks were three ringed plovers, three redshank, six turnstone and two knot. There was also a clear sighting of dippers in the stream coming down to the sea.

Our next stop was The Spinnies at Aber Ogwen. This is a pretty reserve further on towards Bangor, overlooking the very eastern end of the Menai Straits. On the way, we passed a field full of curlew feeding. In the reserve itself, there were a number of hides, some with feeders, where there were an abundance of woodland birds - the usual blue and great tit but also several coal tits and more unusually a marsh tit. We also saw great spotted woodpecker, buzzard and several nuthatches.

On the other side, this hide looked out onto the mud of the Straits, where there was a great variety of wildfowl, including two female mergansers, a pair of goldeneye, wigeon, little egret, little grebe and shelduck. On an inland pool were many teal. Moving to another hide, again looking onto an inland pool, we saw a mixed group of green- and redshank and when they flew off one of these was seen to be the more unusual spotted redshank.

We had been hoping to see kingfishers on this Reserve but alas, as with the hawfinch, they refused to oblige! At this point a number of us were satisfied with the birding (and freezing cold) and ready to make our way home. Others who were more hardy and had remembered their membership cards were keen to take the opportunity to visit the Conway Reserve on the way back. Here, one member of the group spotted the elusive firecrest.

As we made our way back to Chester, the blanket of fog descended and we felt lucky that we had chosen the right direction to find the sunshine and been able to see a wide variety of birds in some beautiful locations.

CH