Thanks to Sue Greig who got in touch to say that she spotted a small flock of barnacles on the Glencaple side of the river one morning this week.
“One was ringed so I sent information to Larry Griffin at WWT”.
This is his reply:
This is one of the older birds in the population having been ringed as an adult male of unknown age on Svalbard on 1/8/95, so 23+.
Has been a regular on the reserve most winters but likes to venture up the Nith too.
So an elderly goose!
The oldest recorded barnacle goose was 30+ and could have been older – that’s a lot of migrations from Svalbard!
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