Pallas's Warbler photographed at Ty Coed on 13/11/2005 Photo: © Vic Froome (visit site)

Pallas’s Warblers are a bird of coniferous mountain woodlands breeding in southern Siberia, Mongolia and parts of Tibet and China. It is strongly migratory and winters in subtropical Asia. Despite it’s tiny size it is prone to vagrancy as far as western Europe in late October and November, despite a 3000 km distance from its breeding grounds and numbers of migrant birds have increased in western Europe in recent years.

The first Bailiwick record was from La Fougeraie, Sark on 23 October 1971 and this was followed by two more records from there in 1978 (no details) and 29 October 1982. It was not until 20 years after the first Sark record that this species was recorded in Guernsey in 1991 and then again in 1994. These two birds heralded a remarkable series of records and Pallas’s Warblers are now almost annual, averaging one record per year, including 3 in 1996 and 2 in 2001. Approximately a third the records come from ringers operating at Pleinmont and near the Vale Marais but other records come from a wide variety of locations around the island and include most of the larger wooded areas.