Dave Ferguson has kindly updated the graphs showing the occurrence of some of the scarcer visitors to Buckinghamshire. For each of these species there is a graph showing the occurrence year by year and a separate graph showing the distribution of the species during the calendar year. Some of these are quite revealing. The species covered are the scarcer species that typically occur annually or near annually. The rarer species have all sightings listed on the Bucks Species List.
- The rarer birds with full details of sightings included in the Bucks Species List include birds such as the Divers, the Skuas, Dipper, Snow Buntings, etc.
- The scarcer birds with graphs include such species as the rarer Grebes, Bittern, the scarcer Swans, Smew, Red-breasted Merganser, Pied Flycatcher, Ring Ouzel, etc.
- The commoner species records are contained in the Annual Reports, the Monthly Bird Bulletins and in the Goingbirding database.
A couple of example of the graphs available are given below:
Graphs for Smew
Smew have always been a bird of cold winters and it has always been unusual to see one before December. However numbers have declined dramatically since 2000 with no records since 2016. Is this due to Global Warming?
Graph for Curlew Sandpiper
Curlew Sandpiper is a decreasing species in the county. While good numbers were recorded on a few occasions in the last century, they have all but disappeared from our annual reports. Note that the largest flock recorded is eight, so the records for 1985 and 1990 refer to multiple flocks.
All of the graphs can be accessed via the Bucks Species List where the words “See Chart” are given. Just click on these links to view the graphs. See image below.
