Last of the summer wine?

Thursday 27th Aug.
Last session of the 2009 season for Constant Effort ringing. Now we go back to ringing for ourselves. A decent day to round off the summer with 27 birds of which 26 were juvvies & 19 were new. The only adult bird was a male Goldfinch in moult.

(Retraps in brackets). Wren (1), Dunnock 2 (1), Blackbird (3), Reed Warbler 4, Lesser 'throat 1, Whitethroat 1 (1), Blackcap 5 (2), Treecreeper 1 - our 2nd in a week, Greenfinch 1, Goldfinch 3, Bullfinch 1.

An adult male Sprawk came down the 'dark' (north) side of the Long Hedge and hit the net by a pole as I was walking up. Even though I was quite close, it wriggled and got out. Half an hour later, it came back over. There has been a noticeable increase in 'feathers' on the ground recently, presumable from his (or his like) attacks. Also a male Kestrel.

This year has been not been the best for adults - I suspect they have had it relatively easy and have been breeding "non-stop". The juveniles have excelled themselves; it has been the best year since 1992-1994! It was the best productivity ever for Dunnock, Robin, Song Thrush, Blackcap, Chiffchaff, & Goldfinch - and 2nd best for Blackbird & Great Tit.

Statistics:- 372 individual birds caught, 99 adults (51 birds from previous years), 273 juveniles.

Saturday 22nd August 2009

Another quiet morning. Main point of interest was trying to work out how many Gadwall were present on Fingers. DK said 5 when I saw him. I settled for three and EN was on 7! Still there are plenty of places to hide.

There were 3 Grey Wagtails on the canoe slalom. I had at least 10 Reed Warblers mostly on the north side of the main lake but one seen over at the STW reed bed.