Ringing recovery

Back on 28th October last year, I caught a Lesser Redpoll which already had a ring on it (not one of mine). You can read the original post (and see a photograph of the bird) here. The guided bird walk on that day, led by DB, were lucky enough to see this bird during a ringing demo and I can now tell you where it came from.

It was originally ringed on 13th October 2012 near Bestwood, Nottinghamshire. It moved a distance of 113km in a South, South East direction, within 15 days.

Saturday 9th February

Met up with DK and JA who were already on a Shelduck when I arrived and it was still on the main lake late morning. We quickly located the Ferruginous Duck (FD) and the Black-necked Grebe. The FD is still hanging around with the Pochard flock. They are very sensitive to people near the dipping platform, coming in close to feed but moving out whenever anybody approaches. You can get good views if you are prepared to stand quietly until the flock drifts back in again.

The BN Grebe is seldom coming close to shore preferring to stay out in the middle of the main lake most of the time so scopes and long lenses are the order of the day for that one.

The rest of the morning was pretty standard fare. The Teal at Kramer hide were getting a bit feisty which was fun to watch and later we had good views of a Lesser Redpoll along the east side of Fingers.

Lesser Redpoll

 DK led the Beds. Bird Club walk on Sunday morning and by all accounts it was a good morning despite the terrible weather. Following per DK:

"Ferruginous Duck and B-n grebe still present. Also 2 Kingfishers, nice

views of Water Rail, Siskins, Goldcrest and Mink. 44 Species."

 

Ringing 02/12/12

A glorious day, a bit on the cold side but if you kept active and wrapped up, you could certainly keep warm. I was out ringing in the rough.



Above: An adult male Kestrel. This is only the second ringed here (the other in 2003).

Above: 6 more of these Lesser Redpolls were ringed today. I like an excuse to show another picture of one of these!

Totals for the day (retraps in brackets):


Kestrel 1 (0)
Wren 2 (2)
Dunnock 0 (1)
Blackbird 5 (0)
Blackcap 3 (0)
Goldcrest 1 (1)
Long Tailed Tit 0 (2)
Blue Tit 1 (2)
Great Tit 1 (1)
Chaffinch 1 (0)
Lesser Redpoll 6 (0)
Bullfinch 3 (0)

More about this catch can be found here.

Bird of the day

Star bird for the day: Lesser Redpoll. This bird was originally ringed at an, as yet, unknown location:

.

Ringing totals for today consisted of 52 new birds, 10 retraps and 1 control (i.e. originally ringed elsewhere) of 14 speceies. The species totals are as follows (retraps in brackets):

Blackbird 3 (0)
Blue Tit 3 (0)
Bullfinch 5 (0)
Chaffinch 1 (0)
Dunnock 2 (3)
Goldcrest 3 (2)
Goldfinch 9 (0)
Great Tit 2 (1)
Greenfinch 1 (0)
Lesser Redpoll 12 (+ 1 control)
Long Tailed Tit 7 (3)
Reed Bunting 1 (0)
Robin 1 (0)
Wren 2 (1)

The only other ringing records for Lesser Redpoll are nine in 2005 and one in 2007 (all new), hence the star status of the bird pictured above!

Also, at dusk 3 swallows were seen by myself and DK.

Saturday 27th October

A cold start this morning with a strong wind blowing, intitally from the NE then swinging around to come from the NW. I arrived before 7am and some of the Corvids were already out and about in a large group over the main lake. The main bulk of the roost left around 07:20.

A large raft of 66 Coots were up the NW corner of the main lake and another 12, with 18 Great Crested Grebes were over towards the east side.

Down at Fingers there were 3 Little Egrets still in the roost and they left a little after the Corvids.

Redwings, Fieldfares and Woodpigeons started coming through in small groups shortly after first light and the final totals, courtesy of DK, were:

481 Woodpigeons S
199 Redwings W
183 Fieldfares W
We also had 42 Starlings W.

From the south side of the main lake DK spotted 9 Pochards doing circuits of the main lake.

A nice end to the walk around the park was a single Goldcrest in the NW (Beefeater) corner and then 3 Lesser Redpolls shortly after, along the north side of the main lake.

So some nice birds around, hopefully some will hang around for tomorrows guided walk. Don't forget to put your clocks back 1 hour tonight and meet at the visitor centre at 9am (GMT). Wrap up warm, it looks like another cold start!
Here's a rather obscured picture of the Redpoll which did a great job of staying in cover after the cameras came out of the bags!

Lesser Redpoll