Lots of productivity

We thought it would be a dream day for ringing. 7-eighths cloud plus a gentle, subsiding wind, it looked as if it might get better. Dream on. It was COLD! During the first half of our Constant Effort session we, Ed and I, caught eight (8) new birds, and no retraps, of seven species. Put another way, that's one every net round, just about. Mind you, one of them was a full adult male with a stonking brood patch - and his tongue hanging out! Ed had done the last one and I normally give them away to trainees - but today there weren't any, so I had it for myself!
Today's adult male Green Woodpecker (D Kramer)

As the cloud cover increased, it warmed up a fraction. On the minus side, the north west wind picked up a shade, too. "Blow me down", at half-eight, the tit flock passed over and we ended up with ten (10) birds in the nets; the six tits, three with 'nest box rings', also pulled in four more warblers. Well, we thought that was it, a fluke, and over for the day. Perhaps another six might see us to the end of the session, finishing a bit below par for the site and time of year.

Not to be, thank God. We ended up with a grand total of 35; 26 of them were new and 27 of them were birds of the year (four already ringed). So it ended with a list like this:
Green Woodpecker 1
Blue Tit 3 (1)
Great Tit 1 (3)
Chiffchaff 4 - all youngsters
Blackcap 4 - inc a new adult pair
Garden Warbler 1 (1) - the retrap male was ringed as a 4M in May 2008
Whitethroat 3 (1) - our first 3J's of the year & 2 of them had started PJ moult
Our first young Common Whitethroat of 2010

Wren 2 (2)
Blackbird 2 - 3JM & 3JF of the 'longer-winged' variety
[we seem to have 2 sub-populations; with short wings and long wings]
Robin 2 - a couple of spotty juvs caught simultaneously
Dunnock 3 (1) - new youngsters and an old favourite lady from 2007 who was in egg again.

Just to finish off: record shots of the net rides after this week's grass cut and the sides trimming up

Nets 2 & 1 (run N/S) - now disappears into "ash woodland"

Nets 3 & 4 (run E/W) - 'downhill' towards Fingers Lake

40' extra net run - useless until autumn passage; also used as 1 of 2 winter feeding sites.