A long-staying Forster’s tern has become something of a local celebrity along the Dorset coast in recent years. First discovered in Poole Harbour in April 2023, the bird caused a small twitch at the time as one of only a handful of records for Britain. What makes it even more remarkable is that the same individual has now returned each spring, with sightings again in 2024, 2025, and 2026, making this its fourth consecutive year back in Dorset.
It is reportedly believed to spend the winter in Brittany, France, the tern appears to have adopted a loose circuit between western Europe and the UK, occasionally wandering as far as Ireland before returning to its favoured haunts around Poole Harbour. Normally a North American breeder, Forster’s tern is a rare vagrant to Britain, so having one being faithful to this site is quite exceptional.
After its discovery in spring 2023, the Forster’s tern gradually became more predictable around Poole Harbour as the summer progressed. Although initially elusive, the bird eventually settled into a loose routine and was most frequently seen at several well-watched sites around the harbour:
- Shipstal Point - by far the most reliable spot, with the tern often working offshore or roosting on posts and buoys.
- Brownsea Lagoon - regularly used as a feeding and roosting area within the harbour.
- Lytchett Bay / Lytchett Fields - where the bird was seen intermittently, particularly during early stages of its stay.
- Marker buoys and posts around the harbour channels, where it frequently perched between feeding flights.
By late summer and autumn the tern was most consistently encountered off Shipstal Point (Kev and I visited in August 2023 - report here), often associating loosely with feeding flocks of other terns.
With its return this year, the bird has been seen and photographed in Poole Park, mainly around the main boating lake where it tends to move between a few favoured spots. Enticingly, it has been photographed perched on the short posts near the enclosed reedy area on the eastern edge of the lake. After discussing it with Kev @kev07713, we decided this would be a good opportunity to try for the bird while it was showing so reliably in one area, so we set off for Poole at around 5.30am, stopping for breakfast along the way.
We arrived at Poole Park only to discover that access to the park was restricted from 7.45–10.00am on Saturdays due to the weekly Poole Parkrun, which takes place around the boating lake. Pulling up briefly, we scanned across the water and could see a few birders already gathered on the far side. With no easy way in from where we were, we returned to the car and began plotting an alternative route to reach one of the other gates further around the park.
After a bit of rerouting we eventually found some roadside parking, paid the meter and started the walk back towards where the small group of birders were standing. From a distance there was little sign of any coordinated scanning or cameras pointing in one direction, suggesting the bird probably wasn’t present ... at least not yet.
We joined the small group of assembled birders, around ten in total, and almost immediately someone pointed out the Forster’s tern flying in from over the lake. Another birder turned to us and remarked that our timing couldn’t have been better, as this was the first sighting of the day, with some people having already waited two hours.
Later, one of the birders who had travelled down from Lowestoft mentioned that he had encountered the bird earlier out in Parkstone Bay. It had suddenly appeared in front of him, plunged straight into the water, and then flew directly over his head. A passing dog walker had then pointed him in the direction of the spot where we were now standing.
The bird soon settled on a line of posts, though initially hidden behind the reeds lining the edge of the pool, alongside several black-headed gull and a couple of common gulls. A few of the birders moved off to the left, walking out onto the end of a concrete structure so they could look back along the row of posts where the tern was perched.
Across the water we could see large numbers of people gathering for the parkrun and soon they were off and running around the park and the boating lake; this parkrun regularly hosts 800 to over 1,000 runners and is one of the larger events in the UK.
Before long, the Forster’s tern flew out and landed on a post beyond the reeds. Its arrival set off a small chain reaction among the gulls, each black-headed gull shuffling forward to the next perch in turn, creating a domino-like effect along the line of posts until the movement finally stopped at an empty one. By moving to the right, we were able to get a relatively clear view between the posts and settled beside a couple of birders. One of them turned out to be Scott Usher @SStanpit, whose posts and photos I had seen on social media before.
In March, the Forster’s tern is in non-breeding plumage, with the black cap reduced to a small patch of grey on the crown but with distinct black feathers around the eyes, giving it a subtle masked appearance. The upperparts remain soft grey, the underparts white, and the slender bill is darker than in summer.
Its flight is light and agile, often hovering briefly over the water before plunging to snatch small fish, making it a graceful yet understated visitor compared with the striking plumage it shows in summer. As we continued watching, the bird eventually took flight, circling the pool before heading out over the lake and then departing with strong, purposeful wingbeats.
Only fifteen to twenty minutes later, the Forster’s tern returned, initially landing again on the far side of the reeds before moving to the same perch where we had observed it earlier.
Two sandwich terns dropped onto the posts; one perched out in the clear and not far from where the Forster's tern had been - another new species for the year. Sandwich tern typically return to Britain in March and April each year, arriving at their breeding colonies along the coast, with most of the first arrivals seen in southern and eastern England. This was a week or two earlier than I expected to see any so was a welcome surprise. Colonies are soon active, from April through July, with chicks appearing by late May or June.
Around Poole Harbour, sandwich terns nest in a few key colonies, usually on small islands and sheltered spits within the harbour. These are part of a network of coastal breeding sites in Dorset and include Brownsea Island, the largest and most reliable colony in the harbour, often mixed with common terns and occasionally Arctic terns.
I wandered over to chat with a birder I’d recognised from a few places earlier in the year and found him talking with a couple who looked as though they’d just finished the parkrun. It soon became clear that the young woman was actually the birder, and she’d been pointing out the tern to people as they ran around the lake - as well as mentioning a mandarin duck on the pool.
A mandarin duck ... wait a minute.
I asked where it was, thanked her, and headed back to Kev with the news, as we both still needed one for our year lists. After saying our goodbyes, we made our way to the pools behind, where we quickly found the mandarin among a small number of other ducks.
Mandarin ducks are now well-established in Britain, although they are not native to these shores. Originally from East Asia, particularly China, Japan and parts of Russia, they were introduced to the UK several centuries ago as ornamental birds for collections and estate lakes. Inevitably, some escaped captivity and gradually formed self-sustaining wild populations.
Over time the species adapted remarkably well to British conditions, and today mandarin ducks are widespread across much of England, especially in the south and Midlands. They favour quiet, tree-lined waters such as woodland pools, slow-flowing rivers and park lakes, where mature trees provide suitable nesting sites. They are largely resident, though often more noticeable in winter when birds gather on open water with males being at their most spectacular from autumn through spring, displaying their ornate plumage - complete with orange sail-like feathers. They are a useful species for the year list when one unexpectedly appears among more familiar wildfowl.
We noted that ten glossy ibis were being reported from the North Wall towards the bypass at Wareham and, having never seen this species in such numbers together, decided it was worth a visit. We soon pulled into the car park and made our way up to the higher ground to begin scanning - as we did Kev mentioned he'd been here before, possibly to see a Boneparte's gull.
Despite thorough searching with our scopes, we drew a blank. I climbed a little further to speak with a chap sitting on a bench scanning with binoculars, but he hadn’t seen the birds either and had already been waiting for over half an hour - then a family who mentioned that the birds sometime fed on the other side of the bypass. Undeterred, we continued to check every corner we could - across the marsh, over towards the bypass and anywhere that looked remotely promising - but there was still no sign of any ibis. We stopped and talked to a young couple coming the other way only to find it was our park runners from earlier.
Eventually we walked round and through the underpass to scan the opposite side, though the only additions to the day list were goldcrest and Egyptian goose. We knew we might regret leaving, but our options were either to wait in the hope the birds returned at a sensible time or to move on and try for something else on the way home. In the end we chose the latter; glossy ibis are now regular enough that we will see one closer to home, and it was really the unusual total of ten birds together that had drawn us here in the first place. Later there were reports of the birds returning - c'est la vie.
We’ve enjoyed several good birds at Acres Down in the past, but on this visit our main target was woodlark, which had already been reported there several times this year. Having seen them here before, we arrived hopeful, though the full car park meant leaving the car further back down the track before setting off across the site.
We walked slowly, stopping frequently to listen and scan with binoculars and scopes, but the heath felt unusually quiet. There was still movement to hold our attention: several stonechats fed busily, great tits moved through the trees and bushes, a Dartford warbler called from the gorse, and half a dozen meadow pipits flicked up intermittently. We were joined by a handful of other birders, most seemingly hoping for views of goshawks, but the conditions were against them with low cloud, mist and a cool breeze.
At least five ravens passed overhead, two of them engaging in an impressive tumbling display, folding their wings halfway and flipping forward in a loose somersault, rolling effortlessly through the air before catching themselves and climbing again. The performance continued with a series of twists and rolls - part acrobatics, part play - a behaviour typical of ravens in early spring, serving both as pair bonding and a form of territorial display. Someone mentioned seeing up to seven.
Despite our efforts we failed to find the target bird, though the walk itself was enjoyable and rewarding for what it was. Eventually it was time to head for home, with three additions to our year lists.
Monday arrived and as usual Charlotte headed off to play pickleball and then cards and I decided to go out myself and see if I could see the ferruginous duck at Ryton Pools Country Park near Coventry - local. Kev was unfortunately busy, so I decided that I'd still go, solo. I'd never been there, typically choosing Brandon Marsh to visit in that rough locality. I drew up in the car park, paid the parking fee and set off on a walk of just under a mile to Paget's Pool on the southern end of the site and near the Bubbenhall Woods and Meadow Nature Reserve.
Paget’s Pool is one of the quieter corners of Ryton Pools Country Park, tucked beside woodland and surrounded by a mosaic of wetland habitat that feels far more secluded than the park’s apparent popularity might suggest - there is a substantial Visitor's Centre. Reached along well-worn paths, the pool opens gradually through trees and reeds, revealing a pool of water edged with marginal vegetation and soft, marshy ground.
A bird hide overlooks the pool, offering a sheltered view across the water and the reed-fringed margins. It’s a good vantage point for watching waterbirds, although the two small islands with thin trees mean the view isn’t entirely uninterrupted. The day before, a redhead smew had been reported alongside a ferruginous duck, but just minutes before my arrival, someone had posted only the duck on BirdGuides - the smew, however, remained unreported.
I spent about fifteen minutes scanning from both the viewpoint and the hide without spotting anything unusual, seeing only swans, Canada geese, mallards, tufted ducks, little grebes, gadwall, coot, and moorhens. Then, at the very back edge, something caught my eye and dived before I could get on it, perhaps another little grebe. When it resurfaced, I realised it was the ferruginous duck. I watched it diving, feeding, and preening out of view from my camera. Finally, for a moment, it cruised from behind the trees, giving a perfect opportunity for a photograph.
Ferruginous duck remains an uncommon visitor in Warwickshire, but records have become increasingly regular in recent years, typically involving single birds lingering for weeks or even months. Nationally, the species winters mainly in southern Britain and often associates with pochard flocks, moving locally between wetlands, which perhaps explains why Warwickshire sightings shift between sites during a season. Napton Reservoir is a particularly well-known site among local birders, with a male ferruginous duck often showing well among other waterfowl during spring visits, and there’s even information suggesting breeding activity.
In inland counties like Warwickshire, ferruginous duck occupies one of birding’s greyer areas: genuine vagrants mix with birds of uncertain origin. The species is naturally occurring in Britain, breeding across eastern and central Europe and wintering further west into Europe, and wild birds regularly reach the UK, particularly in autumn and winter. A fair proportion are likely genuine wild wanderers, though absolute proof is rarely possible. Whatever their status, it’s always a delight to see one.
Year list: 189.
