Dutch Birding volume 37 (2015) no 5

Black Stork wintering near Schiphol in November 2014-April 2015

From 12 November 2014 to 20 April 2015, a first-year Black Stork Ciconia nigra wintered at Schiphol and surrounding areas, Noord-Holland, the Netherlands. Previously, only a few records in December were known and, in spring, the first birds are normally seen from March onwards. Remarkably, there were two records in February 2015 and one in early March which may relate to other (migrating) individuals. This was the first documented wintering for the Netherlands. Birds regularly winter as far north as Portugal, Spain and southern France and, in smaller numbers, in Bulgaria. Annually (since 1993), a few birds winter as far north as Franche-Comté, France, and there are cases of wintering in southern Germany, in 2000/01 and 2001/02 (probably same bird) and December 2014, as well as single-day records in Germany (at different sites) in December 2012, January 2013, December 2013 and January 2014. One bird wintered in Switzerland in 1997/98 and then returned each winter from 2000/01 to 2013/14. A Dutch-ringed bird wintering in northern France in 2009 was found dead in Belgium. A weakened immature was taken into care in northern Poland in January 2001, constituting the most northerly winter record.

Enno B Ebels, Joseph Haydnlaan 4, 3533 AE Utrecht, Nederland
(ebelswxs.nl)