Back again

Whilst searching in vain for flycatcher and warbler at St Mary's Island this week I came across an old acquaintance (other than Dick that is). Black headed Gull J9CE was back on its late summer patch having spent April through July in Norway. This is a repeat of my post last year about the same bird having this routine. Having been seen in September 2012 at St Mary's it was in Molledammen, Norway for April / May 2013 returning to St Mary's by 11th July and last seen in this country on 7th September.

This year it returned to Molledammen on 17th April but stayed in Norway relocating to nearby Oksnevad (Minkfarmen) in July. This is open farmland with large bodies of water in the district of Klepp 25km south of Stavanger and I would suspect indicates it may have bred although Morten who maintains the birds records has mentioned nothing of this. On 6th of August the bird was seen at Orreosen in the same district before returning to  St Mary's Island being seen by MPF on 13th August and six times subsequently by various observers including Northumbrian Birding. 
For the record the bird of unknown sex was ringed as a 3rd calender year on 18th April 2012 and has spent the 892 days since traversing a minimum of 593km across the North Sea five times. The next question is where it goes from October through to March.