Jamie Dunning
@j-dunning.net
I am an ornithologist, broadly interested in the social behaviour of birds.
📚 Research - https://www.j-dunning.net
📚 Research - https://www.j-dunning.net
This chiffchaff has been on Gratitude road since Christmas. Pale throat and breast, brownish above with yellow on the super-c, feels Scandi/Northern. Appreciate looks and light can be deceiving. #BristolBirding
January 10, 2026 at 2:03 PM
This chiffchaff has been on Gratitude road since Christmas. Pale throat and breast, brownish above with yellow on the super-c, feels Scandi/Northern. Appreciate looks and light can be deceiving. #BristolBirding
I've started 2026 with a great day's patch birding in excellent company. Russian white-fronts at dawn, an excellent wader roost, Pintail, Pendulines, a flyover GW Egret (not easy here) and 1,300 finches in a field of Chicory.
w/ @matthall95.bsky.social & @kidphotographer24.bsky.social
w/ @matthall95.bsky.social & @kidphotographer24.bsky.social
January 4, 2026 at 8:21 PM
I've started 2026 with a great day's patch birding in excellent company. Russian white-fronts at dawn, an excellent wader roost, Pintail, Pendulines, a flyover GW Egret (not easy here) and 1,300 finches in a field of Chicory.
w/ @matthall95.bsky.social & @kidphotographer24.bsky.social
w/ @matthall95.bsky.social & @kidphotographer24.bsky.social
Excellent winter birding at Aust this morning, mostly focussed on the 600+ linnet using the set-aside pasture (we managed to ring 30). Possibly two firecrest also wintering here.
Only eight greylag geese over in the cold NE.
Only eight greylag geese over in the cold NE.
December 29, 2025 at 9:48 PM
Excellent winter birding at Aust this morning, mostly focussed on the 600+ linnet using the set-aside pasture (we managed to ring 30). Possibly two firecrest also wintering here.
Only eight greylag geese over in the cold NE.
Only eight greylag geese over in the cold NE.
Happy Christmas from Severnside Ringing (birding/vismig) Group 🪶
December 16, 2025 at 12:33 AM
Happy Christmas from Severnside Ringing (birding/vismig) Group 🪶
Otherwise, 7+ distant divers in the bay, including black-throated, and a Looe island GB.
November 23, 2025 at 1:19 AM
Otherwise, 7+ distant divers in the bay, including black-throated, and a Looe island GB.
Thermal-imaging of two shearwaters in flight over St John's Valley on Lundy last Spring. As well as the bare parts, look at the radiation from the feathered wings!
November 19, 2025 at 10:28 AM
Thermal-imaging of two shearwaters in flight over St John's Valley on Lundy last Spring. As well as the bare parts, look at the radiation from the feathered wings!
Another yellow-browed warbler and a patch-tick woodcock from a foggy Aust this morning. Only goldcrest in the nets and a slow push of finches and redwing overhead.
November 15, 2025 at 12:30 PM
Another yellow-browed warbler and a patch-tick woodcock from a foggy Aust this morning. Only goldcrest in the nets and a slow push of finches and redwing overhead.
Obviously travelling by train. Highlights were flocks of stork -migrating or staying?- and great white egret through the Black Forest 🚂
November 11, 2025 at 2:28 PM
Obviously travelling by train. Highlights were flocks of stork -migrating or staying?- and great white egret through the Black Forest 🚂
Thanks to the CASCB @uni-konstanz.de and @alexhhchan.bsky.social for hosting me today. It was a pleasure to see their exciting work on perception and decision making in person, and to talk about applied models of animal social behaviour.
November 10, 2025 at 5:18 PM
Thanks to the CASCB @uni-konstanz.de and @alexhhchan.bsky.social for hosting me today. It was a pleasure to see their exciting work on perception and decision making in person, and to talk about applied models of animal social behaviour.
Late to posting an early yellow-browed warbler, briefly through scrub at Aust on Monday morning. Otherwise, Siskin moving and single grey plover over. Despite the autumnal feel, still no redwing.
October 2, 2025 at 8:07 AM
Late to posting an early yellow-browed warbler, briefly through scrub at Aust on Monday morning. Otherwise, Siskin moving and single grey plover over. Despite the autumnal feel, still no redwing.
This is the photo that best captures how good Monday was on the Severn. The first sooty shearwater for Bristol, and the first for Avon since 1974 (📸: @aravindramesh19.bsky.social)
September 17, 2025 at 9:03 AM
This is the photo that best captures how good Monday was on the Severn. The first sooty shearwater for Bristol, and the first for Avon since 1974 (📸: @aravindramesh19.bsky.social)
Monday’s Sabines gull was still on the foreshore, below the sea-watchers bench, at Severn Beach yesterday. Still Manx, terns and phalarope in the channel.
September 17, 2025 at 6:53 AM
Monday’s Sabines gull was still on the foreshore, below the sea-watchers bench, at Severn Beach yesterday. Still Manx, terns and phalarope in the channel.
The patch living up to our group’s logo today too.
September 15, 2025 at 8:12 PM
The patch living up to our group’s logo today too.
Big weather delivered an exceptional push of seabirds up the Severn today, including the first sooty shearwater for 45 years, grey phalaropes, sabines gull and Leach’s petrel.
September 15, 2025 at 8:10 PM
Big weather delivered an exceptional push of seabirds up the Severn today, including the first sooty shearwater for 45 years, grey phalaropes, sabines gull and Leach’s petrel.
Here’s @matthall95.bsky.social sea-watching in similar conditions yesterday !
September 12, 2025 at 7:54 PM
Here’s @matthall95.bsky.social sea-watching in similar conditions yesterday !
Rounded off an excellent week with a Sabine’s gull from Severn Beach, pushed up the channel on squally weather. Also, 8+ Manx, comic and black tern, and spoonbill all on the river.
September 12, 2025 at 1:14 PM
Rounded off an excellent week with a Sabine’s gull from Severn Beach, pushed up the channel on squally weather. Also, 8+ Manx, comic and black tern, and spoonbill all on the river.
A hard few days at Severnside (with a wind direction just cutting us off from the seabird action down the channel).
Highlights have been juv. Yellow-legged Gull, wind-grounded migrants, and Black-headed Gulls from Poland and Netherlands in the same scope view.
Highlights have been juv. Yellow-legged Gull, wind-grounded migrants, and Black-headed Gulls from Poland and Netherlands in the same scope view.
September 1, 2025 at 4:27 PM
A hard few days at Severnside (with a wind direction just cutting us off from the seabird action down the channel).
Highlights have been juv. Yellow-legged Gull, wind-grounded migrants, and Black-headed Gulls from Poland and Netherlands in the same scope view.
Highlights have been juv. Yellow-legged Gull, wind-grounded migrants, and Black-headed Gulls from Poland and Netherlands in the same scope view.
Book-shopping with my son today, we found a book with an illustration of a micro-discovery I made as a MRes student.
The paper wasn’t breaking any ground, but I am proud of this particular exploration.
The paper wasn’t breaking any ground, but I am proud of this particular exploration.
August 10, 2025 at 6:44 PM
Book-shopping with my son today, we found a book with an illustration of a micro-discovery I made as a MRes student.
The paper wasn’t breaking any ground, but I am proud of this particular exploration.
The paper wasn’t breaking any ground, but I am proud of this particular exploration.
Lesser Whitethroat seem to always be an early season migrant at Aust - two caught this morning with first tennis ball Willow Warbler of the autumn.
Otherwise, two more crossbill overhead and a site first ring-necked parakeet. 🎾🎾
Otherwise, two more crossbill overhead and a site first ring-necked parakeet. 🎾🎾
July 23, 2025 at 12:23 PM
Lesser Whitethroat seem to always be an early season migrant at Aust - two caught this morning with first tennis ball Willow Warbler of the autumn.
Otherwise, two more crossbill overhead and a site first ring-necked parakeet. 🎾🎾
Otherwise, two more crossbill overhead and a site first ring-necked parakeet. 🎾🎾
Autumnal passage this morning at Aust, with five groups of eleven crossbill and a yellowhammer over the services. Wood sandpiper still on the wetland below. 🍂🪶
July 17, 2025 at 10:30 AM
Autumnal passage this morning at Aust, with five groups of eleven crossbill and a yellowhammer over the services. Wood sandpiper still on the wetland below. 🍂🪶
Successful trip to steep holm today - part of a larger project monitoring the breeding gulls.
June 28, 2025 at 10:35 PM
Successful trip to steep holm today - part of a larger project monitoring the breeding gulls.
Three full grown birds, from two inaccessible sites around Bristol, colour-ringed today at a local rehabilitation centre.
All will now be released back to their nest sites.
All will now be released back to their nest sites.
June 11, 2025 at 4:58 PM
Three full grown birds, from two inaccessible sites around Bristol, colour-ringed today at a local rehabilitation centre.
All will now be released back to their nest sites.
All will now be released back to their nest sites.
Here's that first one too, from a wet gritstone crag in West Yorkshire.
June 9, 2025 at 7:01 PM
Here's that first one too, from a wet gritstone crag in West Yorkshire.
Ten years after I ringed my first, our young ringing group in Bristol ringed our first peregrine chicks in the gorge.
Two males and female - below the iconic bridge, in a cavity peppered with Carboniferous sea-shells. 🪶🧪
Two males and female - below the iconic bridge, in a cavity peppered with Carboniferous sea-shells. 🪶🧪
June 9, 2025 at 6:58 PM
Ten years after I ringed my first, our young ringing group in Bristol ringed our first peregrine chicks in the gorge.
Two males and female - below the iconic bridge, in a cavity peppered with Carboniferous sea-shells. 🪶🧪
Two males and female - below the iconic bridge, in a cavity peppered with Carboniferous sea-shells. 🪶🧪
Our perspective, The spread of highly pathogenic avian influenza virus is a social network problem, has been accepted at PLOS Pathogens - I'll post more when it's published.
@plos.org 🧪🪶
@plos.org 🧪🪶
May 28, 2025 at 11:22 AM
Our perspective, The spread of highly pathogenic avian influenza virus is a social network problem, has been accepted at PLOS Pathogens - I'll post more when it's published.
@plos.org 🧪🪶
@plos.org 🧪🪶