From taiga and tundra to the Broad Acres

Two forms of bean goose are winter visitors to Britain, the tundra bean goose of the rossicus race which breeds in northern Russia and western Siberia and the taiga bean goose of the nominate fabalis race whose breeding range extends as far west as Sweden.

Four of the slightly smaller and darker tundra bean geese were seen with a pink-footed goose at Cayton Carrs near Scarborough while another three taiga bean geese were seen at the Nosterfield Nature Reserve near Masham.

Tundra bean geese occur more regularly in Yorkshire than taiga because they do not have regular wintering sites, so two or three can turn up almost anywhere, usually associated with movements of pink-footed geese.

Taiga bean geese on the other hand are much more faithful, returning to the same wintering areas year after year. In this country there are now just two such sites, one in the Avon Valley in Scotland and the best known in the Yare Valley in Norfolk.

There was a peak count of 485 in the winter of 1991 but numbers have dropped off in recent yearswith between 80 and a hundred present this winter.

The Yare Valley bean geese breed in a remote part of central Sweden and leave the breeding sites in mid- September.

They travel to a large nature reserve in Jutland, Denmark and in mid-November a number move onwards to Norfolk – it is thought that the decline in numbers is because an increasing number have been staying in Denmark due to the run of milder winters.

Those that have come here start to return in the middle of this month and it is some of these returning birds that have stopped off in Yorkshire.

Bean geese were once much more widespread in this country and the remaining two sites are well protected. But overshooting and egg collecting in Russia and Finland in the past has taken its toll.

A great white egret was seen on the lake at the Yorkshire Sculpture Park at the weekend while a drake ring-necked duck, drake smew, and female red-breasted merganser were seen at Pugney's Country Park and Calderdale Wetland.

A red-necked grebe, two lesser spotted woodpeckers and eight crossbills were seen at Angler's Country Park and Wintersett reservoir.

Along the east coast a black brant goose continues to be seen with dark-bellied brent geese at Kilnsea while a flock of 40 snow buntings was at Spurn.

A flock of over 100 corn buntings is being seen around the car park at the RSPB's Bempton Cliffs reserve, while two barn owls are hunting during the day.

Six Mediterranean gulls including four adults were seen in the Holbeck Hall car park at Scarborough while glaucous and Iceland gullshave been seen in gull roosts across the region.

At least 10 marsh harriers are coming in to roost at the RSPB's Blacktoft Sands reserve while a male hen harrier and merlin have also been seen.

A few waxwings are still roaming across the region with 15 in Stoneferry, Hull, 10 at the Yorkshire Sculpture Park and seven in Yeadon, near Leeds.

Four bitterns were located in the annual census at the weekend at the Potteric Carr reserve near Doncaster while a Cetti's warbler was heard.

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