This morning I processed a number of birds ringed in his garden by one of our team who lives in mid-Wiltshire He is not a fan of social media so that is all of the identification you are going to get.
Amongst the birds processed were a number of Starlings. Two of those were recently fledged juveniles.
I thought that this was early, so I had a look at all of our group records, going as far back as we have them on DemOn, i.e. all computerised records. We have ringed 1,398 Starlings of which 75 are recently-fledged Starlings caught in May between 1996 and the present day.
These are the earliest by 15 days, with the next earliest being on the 20th May last year, which was a juvenile caught in my garden in Purton.
According to BTO Bird Facts, based on data collated from the Nest Record Scheme, the mean laying date for the first clutch of eggs for Starling is 19th April, with the earliest record being the 6th April. Incubation is 12 to 15 days, time to fledging 19 to 22 days. If you take the shortest intervals, and the 5th May as their fledging date, i.e. go back 31 days to find the date of laying, unless my maths is wrong, the date of laying is as early as the 4th April.
I just thought that I would share that.
Ringing In The Braydon Forest & Beyond 