Following the disappointment of Saturday I was hoping for better at Blakehill Farm this morning. I was joined by Miranda, Laura and Ellie. Because of the projected forecast, with the breeze coming from the west, we made some changes to the net set up, so that some of the nets would be protected from the wind:
Suffice to say, we did better than Saturday but not as well as we did last time we were here! That said, it was the average for this site for this month ever since we started ringing there in 2014.
It was a very pleasant morning, lots of chatting and a few very nice birds, the best of which was this:
My absolute favourite bird! Anyway, over the course of the morning we caught the following: Blue Tit [4]; Great Tit [1]; Wren 2(1); Dunnock [1]; Robin 1[4](1); Blackbird [1]; Blackcap [4]; Whitethroat [1]; Lesser Whitethroat [1]; Chiffchaff [4]. Totals: 3 adults from 2 species; 21 juveniles ringed from 9 species and 2 birds retrapped from 2 species, making 24 birds processed from 10 species.
The wind got up quite strongly at 10:45, so we shut the nets and started to take down. I had the renewed joy of extracting mist nets from Blackthorn bushes. We were off-site by 11:45.