"The only known corncrake in Wales has taken up residence in the garden of Tŷ Pellaf, the farmhouse at the southern end of the island. This now rare bird is normally only found in the Western Isles of Scotland and in the west of Ireland. There were about 600 to 700 males in Scotland last year and they normally migrate to Africa for the winter and return in mid-April.

This male arrived during mid May and has since been putting out its distinctive 'creek creek' mating call - hoping a female passing on its way to Scotland might stop to sample life on Bardsey!.

Libby Barnden, who lives in Tŷ Pellaf said that it spends most of the night calling! We could hear it calling whilst we were recording the interviews at Tŷ Pellaf yesterday but every time the producer tried to specifically record the call, it stopped! However Steve Stansfield, the Warden at the Bardsey Bird and Field Observatory did manage to get a recording.

This is the second year it has been on Bardsey. Steve has analysed the recordings made last year with those of this year and he is convinced that it is the same bird. Hopefully a passing female may take pity on this corncrake and decide to stop and who knows what the result will be!

Listen to the call of the corncrake...

'Sunshine', the Welsh Black calf born earlier this year is off the island again. This time she tried eating a large chunk of swede whole which got stuck inside her. She was taken off the island and could have ended up as a specimen at the Liverpool Veterinary College but with their assistance over the telephone and a piece of hosepipe (the mind boggles!), Sunshine was persuaded to cough up the offending lump of swede and she is now recovering on the mainland. David Barnden the farmer at Ty Pellaf on Bardsey, is now wondering if she isn't actually a large cat that has just used up the third of her nine lives!

The mother of another small lamb which had been abandoned has been found. Nothing more than skin and bone with protruding eyes, it was christened 'Scary Mary' (only to discover that 'she' was in fact a 'he'!). Not having been hand reared, the lamb was very timid but is slowly, with some TLC from the farmer's wife and others, getting used to being hand reared. He is now putting on weight and looking a lot better. He lives in the garden at the farmhouse.

Marvin No Mates continues to grow whilst Lenor (the 'bonsai' lamb) has grown a little but is still tiny compared with the other lambs. They are both still very tame and are a 'hit' with visitors as they come running when they spot anyone passing by.

I went over to Enlli for the day to help record a programme for Radio Wales about the coming of the telephone to Bardsey Island, due to go out at the end of June.

It is the second of two programmes about telephones! The first includes memories of Porthmadog's GPO switchboard (some of which I own and which was used in the BBC's period drama series 'The Hello Girls' in 1996.)"

Tales gone by: