May Update

May has been a busy month for the birds whether they've been constructing nests, incubating eggs or feeding young (or all 3!). With the mild winter and good weather through April into May, there were signs aplenty that young would be fledging from the nest early this year. But has it proved to be that way?

Ringing results so far this year at Sandy Smith Nature Reserve:

(species that I can expect to catch juveniles)

Great Spotted Woodpecker = 8 adults, 0 juveniles

Wren = 8 adults, 0 juveniles

Dunnock = 5 adults, 2 juveniles (28/05/14 - earliest site record, previous 12/06/11)

Robin = 1 adult, 0 juveniles

Blackbird = 5 adults, 0 juveniles

Sedge Warbler = 10 adults, 0 juveniles

Whitethroat = 16 adults, 0 juveniles

Garden Warbler = 6 adults, 0 juveniles

Blackcap = 15 adults, 0 juveniles

Chiffchaff = 7 adults, 0 juveniles

Goldcrest = 0 adults, 1 juvenile (29/05/14 - earliest site record, previous 21/09/13)

Long Tailed Tit = 6 adults, 2 juveniles (29/05/14 - earliest site record, previous 28/06/13)

Blue Tit = 10 adults, 0 juveniles

Great Tit = 10 adults, 6 juveniles (29/05/14 - earliest site record, previous 30/05/11)

Chaffinch = 7 adults, 0 juveniles

The highlight amongst the above was the juvenile Goldcrest which was only the 2nd local juvenile ringed here after one last year. All the other Goldcrests are probable migrants caught much later in the year.

Above: Juvenile Goldcrest

Above: Another highlight was this adult Jay (2nd ringed at SSNR).

Below: As well as this Kingfisher



Ringing results so far this year at Priory Country Park:

(species that I can expect to catch juveniles - CES visits only)

Green Woodpecker = 1 adult, 0 juveniles

Wren = 9 adults, 0 juveniles

Dunnock = 6 adults, 2 juveniles (31/05/14 - earliest = 11/05/09)

Robin = 1 adult, 4 juveniles (18/05/14 - earliest = 04/05/09)

Blackbird = 5 adults, 0 juveniles

Song Thrush = 2 adults, 0 juveniles

Whitethroat = 4 adults, 0 juveniles

Garden Warbler = 8 adults, 0 juveniles

Blackcap = 18 adults, 3 juveniles (31/05/14 - earliest = 25/05/07)

Chiffchaff = 7 adults, 0 juveniles

Long Tailed Tit = 2 adults, 0 juveniles

Blue Tit = 5 adults, 4 juveniles (31/05/14 - earliest = 22/05/11)

Great Tit = 4 adults, 0 juveniles

Bullfinch = 2 adults, 0 juveniles

There have been other highlights of the CES ringing sessions. A male blackbird, first ringed on 15/10/2005 was recaptured on 18/05/2014, 8 years and 215 days later. This sets a new longevity record for the site and for Ivel Ringing Group.

Above: This Chiffchaff is a British ringed control caught on 18 & 31/05/14.

First ringing details not yet known.

Above: A juvenile Robin

Despite the recent heavy rains, I'm optomistic that this will still turn out to be a good breeding year. It's still early in the year and there's a lot more juveniles to catch up with on both these sites.

Harrold-Odell Country Park today - low in numbers, high in quality

I had planned to do the 2nd visit for the BTO's Breeding Bird Survey that I do each year at Thurleigh, but as it was cool and not at all summer-like, I decided to go ringing instead. The last-minute choice was Harrold-Odell Country Park, which we visited on Monday 30th May in the drizzle. Today started off better, but lo and behold the rain drops started and there was a light drizzle for most of the morning. Under the trees it was still suitable for ringing.

8 birds caught, the highlights being a control Reed Warbler and a Kingfisher.






Photos from the top are:
1) Ringing in the Bird Hide by the lake
2) With the Kingfisher
3) Kingfisher again...
4) Garden Warbler
5) The control Reed Warbler

The full list of birds caught was:

• Kingfisher - 1 ringed


• Reed Warbler - 2 ringed + 1 control


• Garden Warbler - 2 ringed


• Blackcap - 1 ringed


• Bullfinch - 1 ringed

The carrot and coriander soup in the cafe after ringing was most welcome.

Thank you to Richard and Alan for their help (and to Richard for taking the photos).

My January highlights

The weather has been variable recently, to say the least. December was freezing and with all the snow, this stopped ringing activities. By the new year the snow had gone and a session Sandy Smith Nature Reserve (SSNR) on 8th Jan produced just 3 birds; a Coal Tit, Blue Tit and this:



Above: A Kingfisher that had survived the December freeze!

SSNR on 22nd Jan: 4 Blue Tits, 5 Great Tits and 1 Coal Tit.

SSNR on 30th Jan: 4 Blue Tits, 2 Great Tits, 1 Robin, 1 Chaffinch, 1 Coal Tit and 2 new species ringed for the site, 2 Goldfinch and 1 Blackbird.



Above: The first Goldfinch ringed at SSNR.



Above: The first Blackbird ringed at SSNR.



Above: A female Chaffinch.

Number 11

Today was the 15th. CES 11 due to be done today. 15th bird today was special. Lesser Whitethroat - our 4th this year. Maybe it was bred here.

A funny old day; no Swifts seen, for a start. A Sparr over the nets just as they were opened set the scene. Another dire first half (like the previous two weekends). Quite a few screaming young Common Terns flying to and fro with their parents.

It turned out to be quite a good day for the Borin Warbler; we managed to get 4 new ones.

The full line up was as follows:
Blue Tit 2 (1)
Gt. Tit (2)
Blackcap 4
Garden Warbler 4
Les. Whitethroat 1
C. Whitethroat 1
Reed Warbler 2
Wren (1)
Blackbird 1 (3)
Robin (1)
Bullfinch 1
... making 24 birds of 11 species, a bit "off the pace" for the time of year.

There was a fly-through Kingfisher (well above the top shelf), a few Swallows, both Gt. Spot and Green Woodpeckers and a Common Sandpiper over the nearby old lake (Fingers) mid-morning.

A little disappointed that we didn't catch more Whitethroats, just this one mid-session.

The weather was 8 oktas decreasing to 7, breezy but moderating, from the NE going NW'ly, light drizzle initially after four damp days and nights. Will we do better next weekend?

And while we're at it, here is a report from Mark Boyd, who did The Thorns today:

"Hi Everyone

You missed a rare opportunity to say that you were at the least productive Waterloo Thorns CES visit ever yesterday. Conditions were fine, a little breezy towards the end of the morning, but nothing exceptional. There were birds around - a bouncing sparrowhawk, a flock of 40 mixed finches, etc - but not many in the nets. All nets were up by 5.30 am. By 07.40 I had caught two birds. I caught the rest at 10.45.
Here are the totals:

Robin 1 (0)
Bullfinch (1)
Treecreeper 1 (1)
Long-tailed tit (2)
Goldcrest (1)

That's right. Just seven birds in total, of which only two were new."

One bit of good news - we had a Blue Tit leave this same CES site near Sandy and travel to Wicken Fen, a distance of 42km. This is our 4th longest distance, the best being 88km for the species.

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.