With the forecast being for the weather to be bright but breezy, I decided to head for one of the thicker woodlands: Somerford Common West. We set up the same nets as we have done all winter, and I had left the feeding station in place, as I have some seed I want to use up, rather than keeping it to go stale over the summer. I was joined for the morning by Miranda and Ellie, meeting up at 6:30. We had the nets open quite quickly but we didn’t start catching until 8:30, but we didn’t mind: look at what was the first bird out of the nets:
This is only the twelfth Firecrest that we have ringed in the West Wilts group since it came into its current structure on 1st January 2013. i.e. One every year on average. So for Ellie, who got to ring a Firecrest on only her seventh ringing session, that was more than a little special! It did help my decision that Miranda got to ring one back in October and I have ringed three of the twelve, and I am ever such a decent chap as a trainer, so I share out the uncommon birds to my trainees.
Also in that first round we had a couple of Chiffchaff and a couple of Marsh Tit: one new, our ninth of the year so far, and one retrap, plus three Great Tit. The Marsh Tit numbers continue to be encouraging: since the start of the year we have ringed nine. The norm for the first four months of the year is between three and five, so this is exceptional.
One of the key parts of the processing of the birds now, and for the next few months, is identifying sex and breeding condition. This is usually easy for species such as Great Tit, which are sexually dimorphic (actually, second calendar year Great Tits can be difficult, with considerable variety in the degree of pigmentation of the black stripe down the breast), but difficult for sexually monomorphic species like the Marsh Tit. In that case, one blows on the belly and chest to see if the bird is developing a brood patch (female, some males) or developing a cloacal protuberance that sticks out from the body wall (male) or points down the tail (female). I have no idea why but we rather got the idea that this Marsh Tit was a male when we popped him in the weighing pot:
We weren’t catching a lot but we were getting a decent variety of species. Unfortunately, soon after 9:30 the wind really got up and, despite the tree cover, the nets started to billow and blow out the pockets. It was a strong wind, not a breeze with some gusting. Not wanting to potentially compromise the safety of any birds, as shear forces can cause damage, we closed the nets and took down.
The list for the session was: Great Tit 3(3); Coal Tit 1; Marsh Tit 1(1); Wren 1; Song Thrush 1; Chiffchaff 2; Goldcrest 1; Firecrest 1; Chaffinch 1. Totals: 12 birds ringed from 9 species and 4 birds retrapped from 2 species, making 16 birds processed from 9 species.
So, a lovely little catch, with one very obvious and real highlight and we were home in time for coffee!!
Ringing In The Braydon Forest & Beyond 