Globe āŗ Birds āŗ Northern pintail
Northern pintail migration Anas acuta
ā¶ Follow the Northern pintail across the big globe
Press ā¶ to play the year. Line: a simplified typical route, joining the main cluster of GBIF records in each month (adjusted for observer effort).
| Scientific name | Anas acuta |
|---|---|
| Wingspan | 90 cm |
| Adult weight | 1.025 kg (male), 866 g (female) |
| IUCN status | Least concern |
| Records mapped | 3,199,212 (GBIF) |
| GPS / geolocator tracks | none with an open licence yet |
Facts from Wikidata Q25450 (CC0).
When does the Northern pintail arrive in the UK?
A winter visitor in the records: numbers build from late August and stay high until about mid April.
Bars: this speciesā share of all UK bird records in GBIF (CC0/CC BY), by month, scaled to the peak month. Based on 87,811 UK records. Weekly counts from the GBIF occurrence search API (country=GB). Dates are read from records, not from a survey, so treat them as a guide.
When do they arrive in and leave the UK? ā
Migration in the data
3,199,212 GBIF records (CC0 and CC BY 4.0 licences only) are mapped here, in 1.41Ā° grid cells, month by month.
In Europe and Africa, the centre of the records (adjusted for observer effort) is furthest north in June (about 63Ā°N) and furthest south in January (about 43Ā°N).
Month by month: centre of records in Europe and Africa
| Month | Centre (latitude) | South of the Equator |
|---|---|---|
| January | 43Ā°N | 0% |
| February | 44Ā°N | 0% |
| March | 47Ā°N | 0% |
| April | 54Ā°N | 0% |
| May | 62Ā°N | 0% |
| June | 63Ā°N | 0% |
| July | 62Ā°N | 0% |
| August | 60Ā°N | 0% |
| September | 59Ā°N | 0% |
| October | 48Ā°N | 0% |
| November | 44Ā°N | 0% |
| December | 43Ā°N | 0% |
Tracked birds
No openly licensed (CC0 / CC BY) tracking data package for this species was found in the Movebank Data Repository yet, so only records are shown.
About the Northern pintail
The pintail or northern pintail is a duck species with wide geographic distribution that breeds in the northern areas of Europe and across the Palearctic and North America. It is migratory and winters south of its breeding range as far as the equator. Unusually for a bird with such a large range, it has no geographical subspecies, although the possibly conspecific duck Eaton's pintail is considered to be a separate species.
From the Wikipedia article āNorthern pintailā (revision 1368362958), CC BY-SA 4.0.
Sources
GBIF occurrence records, licence CC0 1.0 or CC BY 4.0 only, observations only (no specimens), filtered with: taxonKey=2498112&license=CC0_1_0&license=CC_BY_4_0&occurrenceStatus=PRESENT&hasGeospatialIssue=false&basisOfRecord=HUMAN_OBSERVATION&basisOfRecord=MACHINE_OBSERVATION&basisOfRecord=OBSERVATION. Monthly queries: Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec. GBIF.org (23 October 2026) occurrence data accessed via the GBIF API; a GBIF download DOI is still to be added. Contributing datasets.