Sandy Smith NR Ringing Demo 21/07/10

First of all, a big thanks to all who attended the ringing demo put on by Errol and myself at Sandy Smith Nature Reserve. A special thanks to the Greensand Trust, Liz Millbank for helping organise and Steve Squire for mowing the path & the photographs.I hope you all enjoyed it - I certainly did.

Total for the evening:

Whitethroat 2 (1 adult and one juvenile) - a site speciality. The juvenile was one I had caught earlier (just out of the nest) & it's primary feathers had grown a further 9mm in 10 days!

Kingfisher 1 (juvenile) - this more than made up for the lack of other birds!

Song Thrush (juvenile) - this was as we were taking nets down in the fading light. Sorry if you missed it!

All photographs are courtesy of Steve Squire.



Above: This was a surprise since we caught it in the net furthest away from the river and not in the net we put up specifically to catch one! Having bagged it, I took it over to the unsuspecting visitors. Without giving anything away, I slowly brought it out of the bag to everybody's delight.



Above: I'm taking a wing length measurement.



Above: The flash of blue that people normally see out in the field.



Above: Here you can see the ring, but you can also see the colour of the top of the legs. An adult would have a crayon red colour to the top of their legs. This juvenile shows a dark colour.