New Year's Day hike at Whiteford

In years gone by, myself, Paul Parsons, Colin Gittins and Paul Tabor used to visit Whiteford Burrows in the Gower at the turn of the new year to get the year list off to a good start. Past records I have suggest totals for the trip brought in roughly 60 species, today I got 52 a little down on past years. But it is the first time I've actually visited on the 1st January, the weather was terrible being misty with odd rain showers making photography almost impossible, hundreds of people were walking their dogs along the beach making the chance of finding something good (Snow Bunting, Lapland Bunting or Shorelark) remote to say the least. I did manage a couple of good species though as listed below.


Great Northern Diver - winter plumage adult
Greater Scaup - 1 male, 2 female
Long-tailed Duck -1 female, firstly at the tip of the sand bar and then later in the main channel close to the old lighthouse (bird of the day)
Common Eider - in 2 flocks of 67 and 19 containing 62 male, 2 immature male and 22 female
Common Scoter - 1 male and female at sand bar tip and 1 male and 15 female spread out along the beach surf
Red-breasted Merganser - 1 male and 2 female
Little Egret -11 spread out around the marsh
Merlin - fine male in close flight


Wildfowl numbers also included 12 Great-crested Grebe, 450 Brent Goose, 170 Shelduck, 220 Wigeon, 60 Teal, 20 Shoveler and 350 Pintail. Wader numbers were 1170 Oystercatcher, 58 Grey Plover, 70 Red Knot, 25 Lapwing, 12 Ringed Plover, 130 Curlew, 263 Dunlin, 100 Redshank and 173 Turnstone. A wandering finch flock around the pines held 25 Chaffinch, 6 Lesser Redpoll, 12 Linnet and 4 Goldfinch. Other land birds included 8 Meadow Pipit, 4 Long-tailed Tit, 3 Reed Bunting, pair of Raven and a Green Woodpecker.

Since my last visit in 2010 the beach (Whiteford Sands) has changed quite dramatically through tidal and storm erosion. The beach used to be pristine golden sands for its 2 mile length, but all that is now gone for most of the length and the underlying bedrock and clay have been exposed making it much more difficult to walk on, so I cut back through the dunes about a third of the way along. Below is a stock photograph of what it used to look like and the last photo is what it looked like today.

 2010 - before storm and tidal erosion

2020 - after storm and tidal erosion