A gander at winter geese

WIDESPREAD snow across Scandinavia and northern Germany last week led thousands of geese to cross the North Sea as their feeding grounds were covered; the Hamburg area saw 40cm of snow, the biggest fall this century.

- With Julian Hughes

Most numerous were European White-fronted Geese, of which many thousands crossed eastern and northern Britain in a swathe from Fife to Kent.

A small proportion made it into North Wales: a handful on the Dee estuary and behind Towyn were dwarfed by 73 near Burwen, the largest count on Anglesey since the mid-1950s and 42 in the Glaslyn valley, the highest total in Meirionnydd since 1987.