Ringing In The Braydon Forest & Beyond

We were due to head to Blakehill Farm, but the forecast was for it to be far too windy. Instead I decided to have a session in Webb’s Wood. I went over on Tuesday afternoon to check it out and set up the winter feeding station, only to find that there was a new padlock on the gate, which needed a key. There is a story here. Last winter the gate, essentially a thin trunk set on two support poles, one with a hoop through which it passes, the other with a metal slot through which a metal slide passes through which has a hole for the padlock. All well and good, and all Forestry England padlocks in our local area use the same key.

Unfortunately, the locking support strut broke at the bottom and it became awkward fitting it all back together, and it wasn’t exactly secure. I notified FE. Doubly unfortunately, their contractor who does these repairs for them was firstly, ill for a long time and then his vehicle broke down. The gate got worse and somebody cleared it out of the way – because they wanted access. They wanted access to tip the most hideous amount of waste material a long way into the wood. We are talking asbestos and a host of chemicals, alongside a mountain of building waste. I let FE know and they arranged to get it removed.

These people are not only criminal, but incredibly stupid as well: documentation was recovered from the waste and the culprits found. Because of the nature of the waste, it had to be removed by specialist waste handlers, and that took a while. In the interim the gate system was completely rebuilt and the old padlock was working fine. However, so the waste handlers didn’t have to manage a key, FE left the original padlock in place (it is welded to a chain attached to the locking end) and put in a temporary combination padlock. That only caught me out once. Anyway, for the last six months we have been happily using the combination padlock – until I turned up on Tuesday afternoon to find it had gone and been replaced by another padlock: this time one with a Yale type key. So no access. I contacted the beat forester and she was as bemused as I was, as she had no idea it had been replaced. She is going to sort it out and we can go back to using the standard padlock and key. This is a long-winded way of explaining why we ended up at Somerford Common West. I went and set the feeding station up there: I didn’t expect it to have much impact – and I was right.

I was joined by Laura and Miranda for the morning. We arrived on site at 7:00 and set our usual nets. Everything was open by 7:45, before any sign of movement from the birds. It was very quiet until I put a few lures on – but they were pretty much the only bird song. It was very slow. Unfortunately, the wind got up very quickly and it was bitterly cold as well. So at 10:00 we decided to pack up and get home in time for elevenses.

The nicest thing about the catch was five of these:

The list for the morning was: Blue Tit 3(1); Great Tit 2(1); Coal Tit 1; Robin 1; Goldcrest 5. Totals: 12 birds ringed from 5 species and 2 birds retrapped from 2 species, making 14 birds processed from 5 species.

Not our worst catch by any stretch, and always good when Goldcrest outnumbers either of the common Tit species. The wind is looking better for Saturday, so we will try Blakehill again. I set up a feeding station there Thursday afternoon and, whilst doing so, noted good sized flocks of Starling and Redwing around, so fingers crossed!

After Wednesday’s outing to Red Lodge and its reasonable return, and feeling rather unwell, I suggested that we have garden sessions on Thursday, and put off our Blakehill session to Saturday. The wind forecast was the same for both days, so it seemed like a reasonable swap, and gave me a bit of time to feel better.

Miranda was going to have to leave early from Thursday’s session, as she had to get to a previously arranged appointment, so she didn’t set up in her garden. Laura, abetted by Adam and Ellie, ran a session, as did Steph in her back garden. Both of them live just over the border in Gloucestershire: Preston and Down Ampney respectively. I abandoned my effort, as I still felt unwell, but set my garden nets Thursday evening to open them Friday morning.

Then Laura, Adam, David and I met up for our scheduled session on the Blakehill Farm plateau on Saturday. This was my big mistake: the weather on Thursday was flat calm and would have been perfect for the plateau. The forecast for Saturday was essentially the same but, unfortunately, it got windy quickly. As it was, I still felt lousy, and also needed to leave early to take my wife for a hospital appointment, so I just ended up leaving the equipment needed with the team, set up the ringing station and left off. Laura ran the session. They had to pack up at 10:15 because of the wind and a near complete lack of birds.

To the sessions. Steph had a really decent time of it, catching 26 House Sparrows: our biggest ever single session catch of this species! Her catch list was: Blue Tit 11(2); Great Tit 1; Dunnock 1; Robin 1; House Sparrow 26. Totals: 40 birds ringed from 5 species and 2 birds retrapped from 1 species, making 42 birds processed from 5 species.

Laura, helped by Adam and Ellie, had a smaller haul but more variety: Green Woodpecker 1; Magpie 1; Blue Tit 11(2); Great Tit 1(1); Long-tailed Tit 1; Dunnock 3; Robin (1); Blackbird 4; Goldfinch 1. Totals: 23 birds ringed from 8 species and 4 birds retrapped from 3 species, making 27 birds processed from 9 species.

I am jealous of the Green Woodpecker catch. Laura has now caught two in her garden since she got her C-permit earlier this year. I have never caught one in 14 years of ringing in my garden:

Having set my nets the evening before, and topped up the seed feeders, fat balls and coconut shell with fat and peanuts; I had them open just as it started to get light. I put out a couple of trays of mealworms and sat and waited. Almost straight away I caught a couple of Starling, a Dunnock and a Goldfinch. Then nothing until 9:00 when I caught two more Goldfinch, two Blue Tits, one at 10:10, the other at 10:40 and, just as I finished processing that last Blue Tit, a retrapped House Sparrow. Despite leaving the nets open until dusk, with lures for Greenfinch and Goldfinch playing, not another bird caught. Thank goodness I was at home, with plenty of food and drink and alternative “entertainments”: like net mending! Oh! Deep Joy!

To Saturday, I felt bad for the team: Blue Tit 3; Great Tit 3(1); Wren 1; Dunnock 1; Redwing 1; Blackbird 2; Goldfinch 2. Totals: 13 birds ringed from 7 species and 1 bird retrapped, making 14 birds processed from 7 species.

My mistake: we should have done Blakehill Farm plateau on Thursday. Not really my mistake but I always feel somewhat guilty when the weather forecast turns out to be wrong! In the event we ended up with 84 birds ringed from 13 species and 8 birds retrapped from 4 species, making 92 birds processed from 13 species. It would have made a nice haul for a single session!!!

An absolutely cracking month, with some great catches and a few milestones surpassed. It is our largest ever October catch – we got more sessions in, but the overall result is excellent. As ever, Jonny is the largest contributor, but his sites seem to be quite remarkable: averaging 86 birds per session but with three catches of over 100 birds: the biggest being 156 on a farmland site near East Tytherton. Mind, I was quite pleased with a 122 bird catch at Somerford Common, my team’s best Braydon woodlands catch outside of the bird feeding station months.

The highlights from this month have to be:

House Sparrow: at 26 ringed in a single session, at Steph’s garden, that is our largest ever catch since the group came into its current structure.  Mind, it beat the second best by three birds – 23 in Rosie’s garden back in 2023, but that was at Mitcheldean on the edge of the Forest of Dean, so doesn’t count in  our Wiltshire cohort. That said, Steph’s garden is in Down Ampney, just over the border into Gloucestershire.  That said, the king of the House Sparrow catches is Andy. Since he started ringing in his garden in 2016 he has ringed 671 and retrapped 91 of them: an average of 61 ringed every year!  All trapped in and around his garden – not pulli ringed in nest boxes.

The only retrapped House Sparrow of the month, happened to be in my garden on Thursday, 29^th.

Pied Wagtail: our biggest ever catch all in a single roost session at Ravensroost Meadow ponds. The biggest previous catch was just nine birds in 2013 at Calne Conigre Sewage Works and the same for Jonny at a Sutton Benger site in November of last year.

It was an evening roost. The bottom photo makes it look pitch black, but we stopped whilst there was still enough light for the birds to fly off safely.

Redwing: although nowhere near our best ever October catch, which was 129 in October 2024, we only caught three last October, so it is a big improvement on that.  It is our third best October, the second best being 81 in 2021. Indicative of a potentially cold winter?

Siskin: we don’t often catch them in this month. In fact, we have only caught them in October in two sites: Lower Moor Farm and the aforementioned Sutton Benger site. Two were in Lower Moor Farm on the same day in October 2019, Jonny caught his October 2024 and we caught only the fourth for the month at Lower Moor Farm on the 8^th of the month:

Laura had a couple of nice catches: her second garden Magpie and Green Woodpecker of the year. I am certainly jealous of her Green Woodpeckers, having never caught one in my garden. She has caught as many Magpies in her garden in three months as I have in 14 years!

Anyway, very satisfying, hoping November will be every bit as good.

A wind shortened session this morning. I was joined by Miranda, Laura, Steph, Ellie and Adam. Not forgetting Steph’s daughter Bea: full of energy, never stops smiling and keeps everyone entertained. It is a good job that I had this good team out today: predominantly female, three C-permit holders and Ellie, who will be put forward for her C-permit early next year, and Adam who will be put forward next year, as soon as he hits his 16th birthday.

We met at 6:30 and got on with setting up. The best thing about that team, I had so little sleep last night and was feeling pretty lousy, if I hadn’t had such a good team out, I would have cancelled. Instead, I delivered the equipment, set up the ringing station, whilst they did all the hard work of erecting the nets. I then went off home to get some rest and try and dial down the symptoms, leaving the team to get on with managing the session, knowing that they would be fine.

The first round was a good start: 24 birds about 20 minutes after the nets were opened. Unfortunately, that was as good as it got, and the rest of the morning was just three or four birds each time. We ended up on 41 birds, of which 31 were Blue or Great Tits. This is somewhat surprising, as I only set up our two feeding stations there late yesterday afternoon, and they certainly hadn’t taken advantage of them. Presumably just early feeding flocks gathered, as it also included six Long-tailed Tits!

I returned to the team at 10:30, by which time the wind was really getting up. We shut the nets along the main path first: they were the most exposed and they were now catching was leaves. That was then followed by shutting the rest of the nets and taking down.

The list for the session was: Blue Tit 13(2); Great Tit 11(5); Long-tailed Tit 5(1); Robin 1(2); Goldcrest 1. Totals: 31 birds ringed from 5 species and 10 birds retrapped from 4 species, making 41 birds processed from 5 species.

We did have one bird worth singling out for mentioning. It was a Great Tit:

It rather looks as if it has avian pox. This disease arrived in the UK, in the south-east, in about 2005, and spread very rapidly westwards and northwards. It isn’t restricted to Great Tits, but they do seem to suffer from it more than most other species. This is the first Great Tit I have seen suffering from this for a very long time – probably a decade or more.

One of the benefits of ringing birds is that you can get to follow what happens with resident species. I am pretty confident that birds can recover from avian pox. How do I know? I didn’t used to ring birds suffering from disease. One Great Tit that I ringed in Ravensroost Wood we retrapped later, and it had developed the lesions and growths associated with avian pox. A few years later we caught it again: completely clean of any growths but there was residual scarring. It had survived the disease and recovered.

Anyway, with the team being extremely efficient, we were packed away and off site by just past 11:10.

A couple of final points: firstly, when I went to set up the feeders on Tuesday afternoon I was trying to turn into the site. Unfortunately, a dog walker has parked her car right across the entrance. What is it about dog walkers that makes them think that rules don’t apply to them? She parked adjacent to this sign:

I hit my horn once and she went ballistic. By the time that woman moved her car there were a dozen cars queued up behind me: totally inconvenienced because of her ignorance (I bet most were blaming me though). It is like the nature reserves with signs saying “Please keep your dog on a lead” and “Please pick up after your dog”. They have that latter sign at the Forestry England sites, and dog walkers take as much notice of those as they do on nature reserves.

The second point that came up: soon after I got back at 10:30 we heard the hunting horns from the Vale of the White Horse Hunt. Next thing there were hounds running all over the B4696 road that runs from Wootton Bassett to Ashton Keynes. The only good thing I will say about them: two of the riders used their horses to act as a barrier to the entrance so they did not let the hounds into Red Lodge – but that was also why they were holding up the traffic on the B4696, as they moved them across from White Lodge Farm to Oak Copse and Maplesale Farm (I really must have a chat with the farmers at White Lodge Farm, who seem to be very keen on supporting wildlife, to see if they are trespassing.). Who lays a trail that runs across a busy main road? Did they run the trail past the rural police unit and did the police approve it? If the police approved it, why weren’t they there to control the traffic? Were they breaking the law? (Of course they were: regularly trespassing on Wiltshire Wildlife Trust nature reserves, as I have mentioned before, having had direct experience of them doing so on two occasions at the Firs. If it applies to Wiltshire Hunt Sabs and monitors, it applies to them as well.)

This year has been pretty weird: some very good catches and some absolutely awful sessions. With the feeding station in place in January and February we had decent catches of 110 (62 ringed 48 retrapped) and 63 in February (24 ringed and 39 retrapped but, outside of that, catches of 13, 12, 9 and 14 have been hugely disappointing. To be fair, we have had the same pattern in all of the Braydon Forest woodland sessions. We had planned to go to Somerford Common on Wednesday but, unfortunately, I had a stinking cold come on Tuesday and it hasn’t fully gone yet. On Tuesday morning I had popped over to Somerford Common and set up a seed feeder and a peanut feeder. Having decided to change Saturday from Ravensroost Wood to Somerford, because the logging work has started, and I wanted somewhere where the bird life is undisturbed, and as Somerford had the feeding station set up, it seemed sensible. On Thursday afternoon I went to check on the feeders. They were both about half empty, so I topped them up. Arriving on site this morning I went to check the feeders: same as Thursday, so I thought that was a good sign, but didn’t expect what actually happened.

I was joined for the session by Laura, Adam and Ellie at 7:00. Laura’s hubby Mark also came along, and did a great job of brush cutting a couple of our somewhat overgrown rides, whilst the rest of the crew got on with setting up the other nets. He doesn’t ring but is very helpful and helped with the nets once he had finished strimming. A little later in the morning we were joined by Laura’s friend, Jo, and her partner. Jo is based in Reading and interested in the possibility of taking up bird ringing.

We set the usual nets and, whilst the others set up the ringing station, I went and set up my lures for the session. I had Redpoll, Siskin and Marsh Tit on three lures and one, having seen that a ringing friend in Suffolk had his first Redwing of the season, I thought I would try a lure for them. I wasn’t confident, as we only caught one Redwing at Somerford Common in the autumn winter period 1st August 2025 to 31st March 2026. To be honest, we only caught nine across all of my sites in that period. So this was pleasing:

It worked! We actually caught three in total: so a third of last winter’s catch already.

As I was putting up the lures near the feeding station the birds started arriving. And then the Blue and Great tits just started piling in. 56 birds in the first round: 32 Blue Tits and 17 Great Tits! I was particularly pleased to catch three more Marsh Tits: one new and two retraps. It is going well again this year.

This was the list for the session: Nuthatch 1(2); Treecreeper 1; Blue Tit 40(20); Great Tit 29(7); Coal Tit (1); Marsh Tit 1(3); Dunnock 1; Robin 4(1); Redwing 3; Goldcrest 4; Chaffinch 2; Redpoll 1. Totals: 87 ringed from 11 species and 34 birds retrapped from 6 species making 121 birds processed from 12 species.

Apart from our first Redwing of the Autumn we also had this:

Our first Lesser Redpoll of this Autumn : species or subspecies? Genetically a subspecies but recording what you find is largely left up to the individual doing the data entry and no enforced uniformity by the powers that be.

So many titmice. Lots of biting and sore fingers. I did feel a little sorry for this Great Tit though:

Another unusual catch was this:

This isn’t the first time I have seen this, but it is the most extensive example I have found. I presume it is a form of melanism.

Anyway, Ellie had to leave at 10:30 for work at lunchtime, Mark and Adam had to leave just after 11:00 as Adam was attending an educational briefing event in Gloucestershire. The wind had got up and, although the sun was nice and warm, the wind, coming from the north, was bitterly cold. With Laura, they rescued the nets along the main path from the brambles, took out as many leaves as they had time to, and took down. Laura and I extracted the last seven birds from the top nets, then closed and emptied those nets and took down, clearing everything away by 12:15.

So, why is this a record session? It is our largest ever catch in Somerford Common. In fact, it is our largest ever catch in any of our Braydon Forest Woodlands. We have had bigger catches: but at Lower Moor Farm or Blakehill Farm, our key Autumn migration sites. Our actual biggest catch was 140 at Ravensroost Meadow Ponds on 2^nd September 2017: unsurprisingly that was much more autumn migration heavy, with loads of warblers, 25 Swallows being the biggest contributor, and a nice haul of 18 Goldfinches.

Anyway, it was a refreshing change from the recent small catches.

Attached to this post is the annual review of the SPRRG 2026 season. It is such a huge improvement on last year. Thanks to Dick for allowing me to publish it on my blog. I had the privilege of stepping in as Group trainer, when the legend that was Nigel Lewis passed, working with the Group during 2024 and 2025 and putting forward Justine Hadfield and Jon Pepper for their A-permits. Jon Keepen will be up for the same next season.

After my last, hugely disappointing, session at the Firs back on the 5th September, with its 10 ringed and three retrapped from just seven species, we revisited with some trepidation. I was joined for the session at 6:45 by David, Laura, Adam and Ellie, and we set the usual nets. The nets were open by 7:45 and we caught our first two birds just as we were finally opening them: one new and one retrapped Robins.

It was a bit of a frustrating session to start with: we would have a few birds and then a long gap before we caught any more. By 10:30 we had caught one less than the 14 we caught last time. All bar two of those were retraps, just so little to ring. We had a chat and decided that, if the next round was as bad as the previous two, we would give it up as a bad job, cut our losses, go home and get warm. Naturally, that meant that the crew came back with 14 birds to process. I say “the crew” because I spent most of the time at the ringing station leaving the others to do all of the work. In fact, they set all of the nets whilst I set up the ringing station and, at the end of the session, they did the taking down while I packed away the ringing station. They also did all of the net rounds and I only joined them for one. Resting my old legs!

The final round, when the crew shut the nets, did produce a final Goldcrest, which I processed. Most unusual for me to process a bird when the team are out. Anyway, the list for the session was: Treecreeper 1; Blue Tit 7; Great Tit 2(5); Coal Tit 1; Long-tailed Tit 2(3); Dunnock (1); Robin 1(3); Blackbird (1); Goldcrest 1(1). Totals: 15 birds ringed from 8 species and 14 birds retrapped from 6 species, making 29 birds processed from 9 species.

It is most unusual for us to have a catch of Blue Tits with none of them being retraps.

Occasionally one will find people complaining that ringing causes the birds stress, make your own minds up:

Ironically, you can no longer make your minds up. Some coward from the ringing community complained about this photo because the bird was being “held on its back”! It wasn’t being held but I have been told by Ringing Licensing management at the BTO that it is “against scheme rules” and that, because it was lying on its back, its wings were being “held” by its own bodyweight – all 7 grams of it. It wasn’t, as my team and the observers at the time and place could tell you, when it was ready it rolled over onto its front and flew off. It’s so easy to make judgemental calls when you weren’t there.

Since I started this blog on WordPress in 2017, the traffic has grown phenomenally, given the size of the area that I cover. Yes, I have produced a lot of posts: 973 to date, which have been read 68,000 times and I have had visitors from 110 countries / self-governing administrative regions. So far this year alone, I have had just over 5,000 visitors to the site, from 75 countries reading 8,000 posts. I have had three complaints about photographs I have published which I think are for spurious reasons. I would love to know who made the complaints: too cowardly to do it in public!

On Wednesday we were planning to provide a session / demonstration for the Wildlife Trust’s Swindon Well-being Group. The wind and rain put paid to that, so I moved it to today. Unfortunately, the Well-being Group couldn’t make that, nor could Miranda and Ellie, who both had other commitments that they couldn’t get out of. That left Laura and myself for the session. We met at 6:45 (an extra 15 minutes in bed! Luxury!) and set the usual nets. we weren’t expecting a huge catch so, in that, we weren’t disappointed. Actually, we had a lovely session. Some nice birds, one special bird (f0r us), and lots of very friendly and interested people stopping by for a chat.

We were never rushed off our feet, just a few birds every round, but it was a good variety, and we had only our third ever Siskin at this site in 12 years of working it. It is also the earliest of the Autumn arrivals at this site, by 13 days. It is our second earliest from all of my sites: the earliest being four ringed at Ravensroost Meadows on the 16^th September 2020. (Where were they last Thursday, with our 13 bird catch?)

Every net caught this time, which makes a nice change. The list for the day was: Treecreeper (1); Blue Tit 4; Great Tit 1; Long-tailed Tit 3(2); Wren 2; Dunnock 2(1); Robin 1(2); Blackcap 2; Chiffchaff 1; Siskin 1. Totals: 17 birds ringed from 9 species and 6 birds retrapped from 4 species, making 23 birds processed from 10 species.

There was one unfortunately infected bird, this is a Dunnock that was ringed back in July 2023:

To be clear, had this bird had pox when we caught it first time round, we wouldn’t have ringed it. I am presuming that this is Avian Pox. Avian Pox was imported into the south-east of the UK from the continental mainland and spread rapidly outwards and northwards primarily in Great Tits, less so in Blue Tits. However, we have found it on several occasions in Dunnock, almost always on the feet, rather than the facial growths (as well as the body, leg and feet) found in the titmouse species. I thoroughly disinfected my hands and equipment and put the bag to one side for cleansing.

Whilst we were setting up the nets that run alongside Mallard lake, we heard an almighty splash, and then there were two enormous subsequent splashes, with water shooting up everywhere. Definitely not a bird (the local Mute Swans were over the other side of the lake), almost certainly not Otters, I would put money on it being one of the Beavers. We didn’t see this one, because of the foliage, but the last time I heard and saw that, I did see a Beaver swimming across to the Cormorant island. The Cormorants were very noisy this morning, lots of laughing and chattering.

It was lovely to see the three Great Crested Grebes out on the lake. In 14 years of ringing and birding there it is the first time I have seen that they have bred successfully at Lower Moor Farm.

Once again, the Great White Egret was strutting his stuff on the west bank of Mallard Lake.

We started closing the nets and taking down at 11:30. Naturally we caught another few birds, which meant we had to stop and process them before continuing with the take down. It was all finished and we were off site by 12:45.

On Thursday of this week, Wednesday having been far too wet and windy, we went to Ravensroost Meadows. I was joined by Miranda, Laura and Ellie at 6:30, and we set the usual nets. It was very dark when we got there but, as we were entering the site, a large flock of Pied Wagtails flew out of the reed bed that has now taken over the pond there, due to this dry weather and the ponds being empty.

Well, our session was very poor: Blue Tit (1); Great Tit 1(1); Wren 1(1); Robin 2(1); Song Thrush 1; Blackbird 1(1); Blackcap 3. Totals: 9 birds ringed from 6 species and 5 birds retrapped from 5 species, making 14 birds processed from 7 species. All of the ringed birds were juvenile and all of the retrapped birds, bar the Wren, were adult birds.

We packed up at 11:30, thoroughly disappointed at yet another disappointing catch.

With the weather for Saturday morning being bad in the morning, I decided to move our session at Red Lodge to Sunday. However, having seen the Pied Wagtails leave on Thursday morning, I fancied having a go at doing an evening session to see if we could catch them coming in to roost. David, Laura, Ellie and Adam all agreed to join me. We arranged to meet at 18:00. I got there at 17:40, Laura, Adam and Mark at 17:50 and David and Ellie at the agreed time. (Mark is Laura’s husband and Adam’s dad, he doesn’t ring but helps a lot with the grunt work, and is a good laugh to have around.) Laura and I did a quick bit of brush cutting around the periphery of the reed bed, and we had the nets erected by 18:15:

All nets were 5-Shelf Ecotones. 1 & 3 were 12m; 2 and 5 were 18m and 4 was a 6m. We then went and sat and waited for the sky to darken. The Pied Wagtails started to arrive earlier than expected. However, the first bird out of the net was a Robin retrap, that we had ringed on the 12^th September. However, earlier than expected, we extracted 12 Pied Wagtails at 18:30. That was brilliant. We processed them and then went to check the nets again: this time, at 19:15, we took another 41 Pied Wagtails out of the nets! Apart from that, there were plenty flying over the nets.

That was the end of the catch for the evening. We had kept the first batch of processed birds in their bags and, when it became clear that there would be no more birds, we closed the nets. Mark released the “stored” birds and the team released their birds after processing. It was dark but not dangerously so.

It was just the best session we have had for such a long time: and something completely new for my team. I have done a few night roosts myself, but the rest of the team hadn’t and, to be honest, this is the first time any of our sites has been shown to hold a roost like that, and we were so pleased to be able to take advantage. Equally, I was the only member of the team that had ever ringed a Pied Wagtail, so it was right to give them the opportunity to ring approximately 15 of them each.

Once we had processed them all, we furled the nets and left them in place, having agreed that we would come back for 6:00 this morning, open the nets and see what happened, We also agreed that we would skip the Red Lodge session and have an early finish.

It was pretty foggy on the way down. Cold and misty over the meadows. I got to site for 5:45 and had all bar one of the nets unfurled and open by 6:00 when the others arrived. We didn’t expect to get anything until about 7:00. What we didn’t expect, though, was to get absolutely no more Pied Wagtails. There was a retrapped Robin, one that we ringed on Thursday, and a new, juvenile Reed Bunting. We did check the reed beds, did have a bit of a walk in, but nothing flew out. It is really odd: they must have decamped in the dark.

Anyway, last night was so good that we were not unhappy. We took down at 7:30 and were home in time for breakfast at just after 8:00!

Prior to last night’s catch, the entire team had caught just 38 Pied Wagtails from 1st January 2013 until this catch last night. The best previous catch was nine, on two separate occasions. The first back in 2013 in the sewage works near Calne, and the other on farmland near Sutton Benger. My little team were responsible for just five, all singles, before last night. I say “my team”, actually they were all solo sessions by me. A real boost for our Pied Wagtail numbers! Although I just let the team process all of last night’s birds, didn’t take a single one myself, I had already processed 33 fledged birds and one pullus in my career – and 13 White Wagtails. That was due to my early days as a trainee where my trainer had access to the sewage works owned by Thames Water. The White Wagtails were all at the Marlborough sewage works.

I had a look back through all of our records, that go back to the year 2000 and the only catch higher than this one was way back on the 3rd January 2003 in the Safeway Supermarket (now Morrisons (but for how much longer?)) in Swindon! That was 67. The next highest is something like 49 but nothing closer and not many at all in the 40’s. Indeed it seems most of the higher catches were at Safeway Swindon, with one at Safeway, Devizes!

Just a fabulous session: from the pits of Thursday to the peak of Saturday evening – and I had recorded the football, so had Croatia 0 England 7 to look forward to and enjoy as well!

Not as many as this time last year, but still decent. I think that the key issue with the numbers are down to the dearth of birds in my woodland sites. Plenty of food but no water in the ponds and streams. The best catches this month were on Salisbury Plain, as one would expect with the autumn migration happening but, more significantly, on known wetland and marshy sites. I might have to look for some wetter sites for my team. They might not be getting fed up, but averaging 22 birds per session is not good, especially when you have three trainees out with you!

Added to the catch this month were: Barn Owl, Bullfinch, House Martin, Nightjar, Starling, Stock Dove, Swallow and Tree Sparrow. Missing from this month’s list were: Coal Tit, Garden Warbler, Mallard, Nuthatch, Skylark, Whinchat and Woodpigeon.

The Stock Doves and Barn Owls were pulli. I was particularly pleased with the Barn Owls as, when I checked the box in May its front had been removed and we had to find it and refit it. When we opened it up again we found this pair:

The first Nightjar the group ringed was back in 2020. Thanks entirely to Ian and Andy’s efforts on their Salisbury Plain sites, the number has increased pretty much year on year. Last year it was six, this year it is seven, thanks to the second ever September catch. The previous September bird was in 2023.

Something good is happening with our Stonechat catches. This year we have, so far, caught 28 of them. A phenomenal 20 were with Andy and Ian on the Imber Ranges, 7 of them at Blakehill and one on a new site for the species, on a farm near Charlcutt. This is our best annual total, with three months left to go. Peak catches are between July and the end of November, so there is every chance of it improving still further. One key element about the birds caught on Blakehill Farm: it was only last year that the site monitors were definite that they had bred on the site for the first time. We are pretty confident that the four we caught in one session at Blakehill were an adult female and three of her brood: all together, same net, same time.

Most of our migrating warbler numbers were up a little, Blackcap showing the biggest rise, with 83 more birds than last year. However, Lesser Whitethroat were the same as last year but Whitethroat numbers were a little down, and the single Garden Warbler caught last year was one more than we caught this.

The key declines were in Meadow Pipit and our resident species: particularly Blue Tit, Great Tit, Long-tailed Tit and Goldfinch.

On to October!