The Lincolnshire Bird Club

A guy was there at 7am,still there at 5pm when i went home,no sign all day...my usual luck!!

I saw Charlie from New Holland there yesterday evening, he said that he had seen the falcon
- sat on the stump, when he arrived at 5.30 pm on Tuesday, it then flew towards Whitton.
As far as I know this is the most recent sighting.

Roy

on the off chance that someone may know the answer to these two questions:

Previous Lincolnshire records are of course as follows:

a Greenland Falcon caught in a trap at Twigmoor in 1826 -- a specimen in the Strickland collection -- do we know where it is?

An immature female of the Icelandic race was shot at Saxilby near Lincoln in December 1900. This bird is now in the Lincoln museum --- is it still there ???? would be good to get photos of it -- can anyone from Lincoln area check

Having studied the text and photos in Forsman and comparing them to the RI bird I am becoming convinced that there is nothing precluding this bird being a grey juv Gyr. Encouraging comments from some experts on the continent and a birder in Iceland who sees a lot of Gyrs along with comparison of some excellent photos from Iceland also seem to be adding weight to the ID.

The Hugh Strickland collection of 6,000 birds was sent to Cambridge in 1867 following his accidental death in 1853. I don't know how much has survived or whether it went to a university society or a museum. I would imagine that the most likely destination would have been the Cambridge University Museum of Zoology. They should know where the collection is housed.

Saxilby bird was in Lincoln Museum,a few years ago when they closed it the council chucked all the stuffed birds in a skip, the Lincs Trust rescued them and they had them boxed up some were, maybe they have still got them.

The Lincoln museum birds were rescued by the LNU, and were held by Ian Macalpine-Leny for a time (in his attic space). I will check the present where-about's....I know for certain that they are still safe and NOT in land-fill!

_________________
-----------------------------------------------------
Andrew Chick
Website: http://www.forktail.co.uk/

The Lincoln museum mounted birds are currently stored in boxes and are with me at Whisby NR as Ian wanted his attic space back! However these do not include skins which are far as I am aware are still with the museum in Lincoln. Co-incidentally I am in the process of trying to get a contact name for the museum as I am trying to track down the 1976 Little Bittern skin from Birchwood in Lincoln. While I'm at it I will also try to trace the Saxiiby Icelandic Gyr as well.

Cheers

Grahame

Back in 2002 I made enquiries as to the whereabouts of specimens listed as 'retained/held in Lincoln Museum'.

At the time, it was deemed that all of those that had been retained, were held in the storage basement at Lincolnshire Archives. I paid them a visit and with some help only tacked down 7 specimens as follows:

Storm Petrel - collected near Boston in November 1891
Black Grouse - shot by Dr. Harvey at Whisby in 1833
Spotted Crake - collected Saxby September 1910
Red-backed Shrike - collected near Gainsborough 1860-1870
Great Grey Shrike - collected Gedney Marsh December 1906
Yellow-billed Cuckoo - possibly young bird, Boothby Hall, Welton-le-Marsh 30/10/1978
Dipper - female Bardney on 17/11/1962

Unfortunately, there was certainly no Gyr that we found at the time and I was led to believe that anything that had been in the 'old' Lincoln Museum would have been transferred and held at the archives (at that time - if anywhere).

I do hope any remaining specimens have not been lost forever - it would be a terrible waste of some important Lincolnshire ornithological heritage. Some of the above posts give a glimmer of hope.

Perhaps it may be worth between some of us logging details of all known Lincolnshire specimens and their whereabouts?. I assume birds listed for Louth museum for example are still there and especially the Houbara at York and the counties first Two-barred Crossbill at Edinburgh.

However, without wishing to get too much off topic perhaps we should concentrate our efforts on the Gyr first!



Matthew

Thanks everyone I will try and get a contact at Cambridgebut for now Matthew's idea seems a very sensible onethat we shouldmaybe adopt as a county bird recording unit

still working on reference material

Parkin and Knox, the Status of Birds in Britain and Ireland;
Gyr Falcon
Status:
About 150 records of Gyrfalcon from GB since 1950 and at least 200 prior to that date: about two thirds from Scotland>
Grey birds are commonest in October – January, whereas white predominate in Feb – April. In the 25 years from 1950 to 1975, less than 40% of birds were white phase, since then the figure has risen to over 65%. Presumably, the white birds come from Greenland (certainly more white birds are recorded from Ireland than elsewhere in GB and I), but why there should be an increase in these is unclear. Perhaps the situation is the reverse and the impression of an increase in white birds is due to fewer non-white ones coming to GB and Ireland as warming of the Arctic reduces the need to leave the breeding grounds in N Russia and Scandinavia.

Images from Dutch Birding

http://www.dutchbirding.nl/images/fotos/fotoid7067.jpg
http://www.dutchbirding.nl/images/fotos/fotoid7068.jpg
http://www.dutchbirding.nl/images/fotos/fotoid7446.jpg
http://www.dutchbirding.nl/images/fotos/fotoid7011.jpg
http://www.dutchbirding.nl/images/fotos/fotoid7007.jpg
http://www.dutchbirding.nl/images/fotos/fotoid6978.jpg
http://www.dutchbirding.nl/images/fotos/fotoid6188.jpg
http://www.dutchbirding.nl/images/fotos/fotoid90.jpg

below from Biotope Varanger blog

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-rS4psRE1tv4/T ... iotope.jpg
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-TsvYYSskK2Y/T ... iotope.jpg
http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-OwRYylEsetc/T ... iotope.jpg
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-kKRaieD_l8o/T ... iotope.jpg

No news on the whereabouts of Britain's 1st Sea Eagle too - the 1732 Nocton bird?

http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=u_qS ... CDAQ6AEwAA

The Grantham Museum skins were apparently sent to Lincoln per my inquiries in January, I'm keen on tracing a Great Snipe skin that was taken at Marston...



The collection is searchable at http://www.museum.zoo.cam.ac.uk/collect ... atalogues/ and does house a Gyr:

UMZC No. ......... 13/Fal/2/dd/12
Description ......... Skin - Skin (mounted)
Current name ...... Falco rusticolus
Field Collection ... [No data] ....... Date: [No data]
Locality .............. "Britain"; [U.K.]
Acquisition .......... Cambridge Philosophical Society ....... Date: [No data]
Registered ........... [No data]

Although no mention of where taken, I can ask Mike Brooke to check the skin if useful....

_________________
Dr Alexander C. Lees
Lecturer in tropical ecology
Manchester Metropolitan University

Lab Associate
Cornell Lab of Ornithology,
Cornell University

http://www.freewebs.com/alexlees/index.htm
@Alexander_Lees

Hi Alex
That would be most helpful but I guess if there are no label details there may not be much else that can be ascertained though it should reveal whether it fits the general description of the Lincs bird

With assistance from a member of staff at the archives I was unable to trace any other specimens held in storage other than those listed. However, this is now 12 years ago so I intend to re-investigate and will report back. It interesting Alex that it would appear the Grantham specimens have made it to Lincoln at some point and will bear this in mind.

There certainly appears to be some interest in tracking down Lincolnshire Museum specimens. I have posted a topic under General Lincs Birding on the subject and perhaps anything relating to this could be posted under that topic just so as we can keep track of any developments in one place? I don't want to hijack this thread and detract from discussions surrounding the Gyr with that of tracing different museum specimens - but do feel that it is an important subject worth pursuing as will hopefully be evident from my post.

Lets hope we can get some positive results.

Matthew