With the rest of this week, and the start of next week, forecast to be wet and miserable it was lucky that today was forecast to be fine, after heavy rain all day yesterday. Sure enough, at 7:15 when I went to put the nets and things into the car, it was very wet on the ground but just a bit damp in the atmosphere but, by the time I got to site, the mist lifted and the humidity decreased to tolerable levels.
I was joined by Miranda and Ellie for the morning. We met up at 7:45 and set up the following nets:
Regular readers will notice that we did not set the nets along the track to the east of the ringing station. It is muddy at the best of times but, after the recent rains, it was an absolute quagmire and I felt we would be losing wellies every other step!
I topped up the feeders before we set the nets. I had planned to do it yesterday but the weather was so dreadful I decided against getting soaked. The first birds arrived at 9:00. As has become usual, the catch was Blue Tit heavy.
We didn’t have a stunner, like Monday’s Sparrowhawk, to relieve the constant pecking. A lovely male Chaffinch, a group of four Long-tailed Tits (one male and three females) and three retrapped Marsh Tits. It was a less pressured session than recent ones but we ended up with a reasonably decent haul: Blue Tit 24(11); Great Tit 2(1); Coal Tit 3(3); Marsh Tit (3); Long-tailed Tit 4; Robin 1; Chaffinch 1. Totals: 35 birds ringed from 6 species and 18 birds retrapped from 4 species, making 53 birds processed from 7 species.
The wind began to get up at 11:00, so we did a last round at 11:15, and closed the nets as we emptied them. We processed the remaining birds and started taking down and packing away. We left site at about 12:15.
Ringing In The Braydon Forest & Beyond 