Vig Károly: Zoological Research in Western Hungary. A history (Szombathely, 2003)

Phylum Vertebrata 209 The nearest known location of the species is in the Kőszeg Hills (VARGA 1982b; NÉMETH 2000). Also worth mentioning are the synchronized bird censuses taken in the 1970s at the Rába, the boating lake in Szombathely, the Perint, the Repce at Csepreg, and the Gyöngyöshermán gravel-pit lake, and the monitoring-type counts of songbirds from the West Hungarian border region (KELEMEN 1988; WALICZKY 1992; BÖHM 1995; VARGA 1999). The standard zoogeographical account of Vas County bird-life was compiled by JÓZSEF GYURÁCZ (1991). The dominant fauna elements found in 266 species in the county in 1991 were Palaearctic (36 per cent), Holarctic (12 per cent), European (11 per cent) and Euro-Turkestani (9 per cent). Other traces in the distribution types were Mediterranean, North Atlantic, Paleoxeric, Tibetan, Ethiopian, Antarctic and Oriental. Several Siberian avifauna elements are regular winter visitors (BARBÁCSY 1987b). Sporadic ornithological data from the region Many others, apart from the researchers whose activity has been described in more detail, have been working on the bird-life of the West Hungarian border region. The other pupil of FÄSZL, TITUS (TITUSZ) CSÖRGEY, provided, for instance, records of the moustached warbler (Acrocephalus melanopogon) and yellow wagtail (Motacilla flava

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CSÖRGEY 1917a, 1917b and 1928). Findings by generations of researchers yielded the first Hungarian records of the barred warbler (Sylvia nisoria) near Rátót (BERNRIEDER 1941), citrine wagtail (M. citreola— HADARICS 1990a and 1990b; HADARICS and PELLINGER 1993e and 1993f), greater sand plover (Charadrius leschenaultii indeterminata

—HADARICS et al. 1992a; HADARICS 1993; HADARICS and PELLINGER 1993b), bluethroat (Luscinia svecica svecica

—HADARICS et al. 1992a and 1993a), Arctic tern (Sterna paradisaea

—PELLINGER 1993d). The same applies to the first Hungarian breeding record (HORVÁTH 1955) and Sopron Hills occurrences (HADARICS 1998C) of the goldcrest (Regulus regulus), as well as the return of the herring gull (Larus argentatus) to Fertő (HADARICS et al. 1991a), Vas County records of the last great European invasion of Pallas's sandgrouse (Syrrhaptes paradoxus

—ANON. 1908), and Western Hungarian records of the Alpine accentor (Prunella collaris

— SCHMIDT 1986). On April 5, 1998, a Sardinian warbler (Sylvia melanocephala) was caught near the Great Pond at Tömörd, in only the second Hungarian occurrence (BÁNHIDI and GYURÁCZ 1999). Another significant piece of ornithological data was observation of breeding by the great grey shrike (Lanius excubitor) near Fertő in 2000 (personal communication from LÁSZLÓ KÁRPÁTI). Observations from the early 20th century onwards added West Hungarian border records of several further species in the Hungarian avifauna. They include first observations of the great northern diver (Gavia immer)

90 and the white-billed north90 This record may also rest on an uncertain observation. Four observation records in Hungary have so far been certified (HARASZTHY 1998).