Ringing In The Braydon Forest & Beyond

These are recoveries reported to us in 2023. Some are from previous years but were only notified to the BTO in 2023.

Ringed by West Wilts RG and Recovered Elsewhere:

Ringed Elsewhere and Recovered by the West Wilts RG:

Ringed by West Wilts RG and Recovered Dead:

Of these recovered dead the one that I was most disappointed with was the Swift. I ringed it at RSPCA Oak & Furrows before it was released. When released it was perfectly well and flew off strongly. Unfortunately, it was hit by a vehicle whilst hawking for insects less than 1km from my house, and euthanised by the veterinary practice in Purton.

For me there can only be one true highlight: ringing my first Curlew at Blakehill Farm:

Curlew, Numenius arquata

As a part of the north-west Wiltshire lowland Curlew monitoring project being run by our team member (and employee of the Wiltshire & Swindon Biological Records Centre) Jonny Cooper, this is the second colour-ringed / tagged adult bird since the project started, and only the second adult ringed in Wiltshire in at least 40 years. The tag number is white 69. If you live in Cornwall keep an eye out because the first one tagged in April 2021 has been seen each winter since on the beach in Cornwall multiple times, and all over the Cotswold Water Park and the Braydon Forest in the Spring and Summer. This bird has already been seen near Starcross golf course just outside Exeter and then at Portscatho beach, near Falmouth.

There have been a number of other highlights for me this year. My work with the RSPCA Oak & Furrows Wildlife Rescue Centre has given me a couple of golden opportunities: my first access to a Red Kite:

Red Kite, Milvus milvus

I was also able to ring a couple of Swifts, which was the first time I have ever managed to see them close up and age and sex the species and I also had the opportunity to study adult Rooks and Carrion Crows.

Jonny has had multiple highlights this year. The first was a Mute Swan which he rescued from a combination of a fence and brambles at Langford Lakes in August. That was followed by, not just his first catch of a Redstart, but the first he has ever ringed as a part of the West Wilts RG. It was a bird on autumn passage, caught in September at a farmland site near Hilmarton.

Juvenile male Redstart, Phoenicurus phoenicurus*

One would also have to add in the addition of Tree Sparrow to our species list. Again, this is all down to Jonny taking on a tranche of nest boxes as part of the long running Wiltshire Tree Sparrow project. In addition to ringing pulli he has also caught and processed a number of adults.

Tree Sparrow, Passer montanus*

Tree Sparrow pulli*

He also got to catch and process his first Kestrel for six years. His first was ringed as a trainee because he had a very generous trainer! I wonder who that could have been?

Kestrel, Falco tinnunculus*

In terms of species highlights, the team continued to benefit from the sites on Salisbury Plain, again catching a wide range of autumn migrants but, yet again monitoring the Stone-curlew breeding on the Plain and ringing another two this year. However, the stand out catch (to me) was 22 House Martins caught at the site near New Zealand Farm on SPTA on 3rd September. Our previous best catch of the species was also at New Zealand Farm, on the 14th September 2020, with blanks in 2021 and 2022, despite good catches of other species in September in those years.

* Photos by Jonny Cooper

After two busy sessions on Wednesday and Thursday I was looking for a somewhat less hectic time of it this morning. I decided to have a look at Blakehill Farm on Friday to see what was around. I specifically wanted to see what was in the area around the ponds on the south western side of the reserve. I was rather pleased to find a male Stonechat feeding from the bushes around pond 2 and, even better, I flushed six Snipe from the edge of the pond. That decided me so I told the team we would be meeting there. On my way out of the reserve a magnificent Raven was sitting nonchalantly on one of the fence posts lining the plateau. The gloss on its plumage was gorgeous. It is that time of year. Ravens have already started courting, and even nest-building, as evidenced by the activity on New Year’s Day at Webb’s Wood. One nice footnote on that: I reported the activity to Forestry England and the feedback is that they will revise their planned activity in Webb’s Wood this summer to ensure there is no disturbance to their possible breeding.

I was joined for the session by family Childs, David and Rosie. We met at 7:00, so I could have the pond nets set up before daylight, and set the following nets:

The 30mm mesh nets are specifically designed for catching waders. Unfortunately, the only thing they caught this morning was the second smallest bird of the session: a Long-tailed Tit. That’s life: totally unpredictable. I will try again the next time that the conditions are right for Blakehill, i.e. very little wind. The habitat is perfect for both Snipe and Jack Snipe, as evidenced by the fact that they overwinter there every year (and we have ringed both species in January and February). Neither did the Stonechat drop in to the nets, so a double dip on what I had hoped for.

The hedgerow nets did catch and we ended up with 20 birds: Blue Tit 9(1); Long-tailed Tit 2(1); Robin 4; Redwing 1; Goldcrest 2. Totals: 18 birds ringed from 5 species and 2 birds retrapped from 2 species, making 20 birds processed from 5 species.

Although it was a quiet session, apart from the opportunity to have good chat, and to give plenty of training oversight for Adam, Daniel and David, we had some splendid birding. Talking of the Ravens beginning courtship, we had an excellent bit of drama first thing. we noticed a Kestrel hunting over the pond area – and I was happily blaming that for the absence of Snipe. It perched in a tree for a bit and then flew off towards the plateau, where it encountered a second Kestrel. There was definitely some antagonistic behaviour between them but, then, the two of them flew back to the pond area and perched in a tree together. A few minutes later they flew off together, i.e. side by side. Did we witness them pairing up? I think we did.

The final episode that amused the team happened when we set about the final round. Throughout the morning we had a Robin hopping around the ringing station, sitting on my car, foraging under my car, and staying close to us. At 11:15 we decided to finish up. The catch had died off, we were cold and wanted to warm up, so we decided to shut the nets and take down. I went off to shut the wader nets, and the rest of the team went to check and shut the hedgerow nets. The Robin followed them down the track towards the hedgerow and the team went behind the net and the Robin flew straight in still following them, so it was the last bird of the session ringed.

Today I was getting together with a friend, and one-time ringing trainee, Annie for a chat and a bit of ringing. Annie had to step back from her training for very valid reasons (motherhood (twice) and pressures of work) but will, hopefully, be able to take it up again in the future. Anyway, I don’t need an excuse to meet up with her, she’s a good friend. The only other member of the team I invited was Rosie, as I knew she would help us set up and then head off for work, leaving us to natter.

I chose to go to Somerford Common West, as it is usually one of my quieter sites and should give us plenty of opportunity to catch up and chat. We met at 7:30 (ish) and set up the following nets:

As Robbie Burns put it: “The best laid plans of mice and men go oft awry!”. Although we held off setting up the nets by the feeding station until last, and didn’t start opening the nets until all were up, we had birds start hitting them straight away. For once Rosie got to process a reasonable number of birds before heading off to work, to take down some trees that have become dangerous following the astonishing winds we had last week. The star bird she got to ring before leaving was a juvenile female Great Spotted Woodpecker. This made up for last Saturday where she extracted her first but had to leave before processing it. This is the first time that I can remember us catching and ringing at last one Great Spotted Woodpecker in three consecutive sessions! To put that into perspective: we ringed only four of them in 2023! However, on checking my records I found that back in February / March 2017 we actually ringed nine of them in five successive Braydon Forest sessions, with four of them in one session at Webb’s Wood. How did I forget that?

As we were processing the first tranche of 11 birds we couldn’t help but notice the birds flying into ride one. It was busy. Annie and I set about extracting the birds as efficiently as we could, and we closed each net ride as we emptied it, as we decided that we would have more than enough birds for one session. It was hard work and way beyond anything that we were expecting. That second round yielded 71 birds! So much for a nice quiet and relaxed session!

So why Somerford Blues? We processed 43 Blue Tits this morning! Anyone who has ever ringed Blue Tits will understand just what that means: enough to give anyone the blues! (Not to mention very sore fingers!).

The actual list for this morning was: Great Spotted Woodpecker 1; Treecreeper (1); Blue Tit 40(3); Great Tit 9(6); Coal Tit 5(7); Marsh Tit 2(3); Long-tailed Tit 1; Goldcrest 4. Totals: 62 birds ringed from 7 species, 20 birds retrapped from 5 species, making 82 birds processed from 8 species.

It was great to get our first two Marsh Tits of the year ringed, and another three recaptured.

Once we had extracted and processed everything it was gone lunchtime, once we had taken down and packed away all of the kit, it well after lunchtime. It was a very busy session. If we hadn’t closed the nets when we did we would probably have smashed the 100 bird mark. Given that our average catch at that site, over eight previous sessions, was just under 28 birds, that is a phenomenal result.

I was joined for the session today by Teresa, Andy and Justine. We met at 7:30 and set the same nets as last time, adjacent to the feeding stations. We did add one extra 18m net to the east of the ringing station, on the main path. It only caught one bird: our only Goldcrest of the session. Talking of feeding stations, I went to all of my sites yesterday to top up the bird feeders I put up during the winter. I provide a premium seed mix (no wheat, oats or barley) and peanuts. Arriving at Red Lodge I found that some vandal has cut through the chain holding the padlock in place. It is totally mindless: it still doesn’t give them vehicular access, presumably for some fly-tipping. At least, unlike last time, they haven’t (yet?) taken a chainsaw to the gate supports to get in. 

We had all of the nets open by 8:30 and were extracting birds straight away. The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and again and expecting a different result. Last time we were there, on the 15th December, we caught 61 birds from 8 species: today we caught 62 birds from 8 species! This is how they compared:

So, a little variation in the species: Great Spotted Woodpecker and Nuthatch this time, Long-tailed Tit and Treecreeper last time. One similarity between this session and the session before last, the 15th November, was catching another Great Tit with well-developed avian pox. This was definitely a different bird: there were just two pustules, a huge one behind the right eye and a large one in front of that eye. We didn’t ring it. It has been so many years since I have seen it in my local birds, and now two in three sessions at the same site. I wonder why.

Although the numbers of Blue and Great Tits are similar, it is quite surprising how little overlap there was in the actual individuals caught. Take Blue Tits: only four of the Blue Tits caught today were caught in the previous session and they were all ringed in that session. Amazingly, that is exactly the same for the Great Tits: four recaptured today were ringed at the last session. None of the other Blue or Great Tits caught today were caught in the previous session. The two Coal Tits caught today were the two ringed at the 15th December session. So, the 123 birds caught cross two sessions comprised 113 individuals.

The Chaffinch story continues to be a bit depressing: we did catch eight of them, but three were showing signs of FPV, one very badly (it’s leg looked like a particularly spiky pineapple, although the other leg was absolutely clean).

Teresa got to extract and process her first Great Spotted Woodpecker – and she has the wounds to prove it. 

Female Great Spotted Woodpecker, Dendrocopos major (photo courtesy Teresa Farr)

Justine, on only her third session out with us, ringed her first Coal Tit and Nuthatch.

Although the ambient temperature was okay, especially when the sun broke through on occasion, there was a very cold northerly wind and we began to get very chilled, so we cleared and shut the nets at 10:45, ready to take down. Unfortunately, whilst we were processing the few birds we had taken out, another three decided to get themselves entangled in the closed nets! I mean, why do they fly into a solid black line in broad daylight? So I extracted those and we got on with taking down. As I was just finishing my second net Andy came down to say that another two had landed in the closed nets! Teresa extracted them whilst we continued to remove the nets. It shows how well her extracting is developing: taking birds out of closed nets is not something we do for fun. In the end, we didn’t get away until just before midday.

It was a decent session, reasonable catch and plenty of time for training on ageing and moult patterns in juvenile birds: primarily looking at great coverts, primary coverts, alula and tail.

Carrying on from last year’s review, there have been some personnel changes this year. We are still a small group of independently minded ringers, with myself being the only trainer actively taking on new trainees. The group comprises four A-permit holders, four C-permit holders and I currently have five T-permit trainees registered to me, plus one other T-permit holder who has moved to the area and is working with me, but hasn’t transferred into the Group yet. Incidentally, Adam, who became a T-permit trainee this year, we were told by the BTO, is the second youngest licensed ringer in the UK.

To the numbers:

As you can see, this year we started to do a lot more on nesting birds, which is why I have split out pulli from ringed and retrapped. Jonny Cooper took on a tranche of Tree Sparrow nest boxes, alongside a number of woodland nest boxes, and also took on a number of Barn Owl boxes as an agent under my Schedule 1 licence. I continued with the Barn Owls in my local area plus, at the invitation from one of my local farmers, additional open nests, primarily Swallows.

And so to the birds that we processed:

Given how awful the weather has been recently, I am somewhat surprised that we have managed to get out as many times as we have since the weather prevented us from carrying out Winter CES 3 in mid-December. Since then we have managed to get out just once a week, instead of the usual twice until this week. This was our third session since, and inclusive of, our session on New Year’s day. 

The team today comprised myself, Rosie (for once able to stay for most of the session), David and Laura, with both Adam and Daniel. It was a decent session: we met at 7:30, had the nets open by 8:30 and started processing birds straight away. The first bird out of the net was a male Chaffinch. Although it didn’t have any sign, that I would recognise, of Fringilla papillomavirus (FPV), it’s left leg was withered, black and had clearly been broken previously and not healed properly. I showed the bird to the team, so they could see that it was an old injury, but I also decided that, even though the right leg was fine, if I ringed it, somebody else seeing it might decide that ringing had been responsible for its injuries, so I released it some way away from the ringing site, as I didn’t want to catch it again.

We had a steady supply of birds throughout the morning, particularly around the feeding station. As expected, the majority of the birds were Blue and Great Tits. Unfortunately, there was no sign of any Redwing, Lesser Redpoll or Siskin. At least, unlike Thursday at Ravensroost, we weren’t taunted by Redwing flying around the site but not hitting the nets. However, unlike Monday at Webb’s Wood, where we did have 47 birds but from only six species, we did have a bit more variety.

Rosie got to extract her first Great Spotted Woodpecker. We did hear a couple about the place, as we have pretty much at every site for the last few months, but without us catching any. There were also Nuthatch calling, and doing their slow, occasional, staccato drumming, but we didn’t manage to catch any.

The list for the day was: Great Spotted Woodpecker 1; Blue Tit 7(13); Great Tit 5(11); Coal Tit 4(2); Marsh Tit (3); Wren 1; Dunnock 1; Robin 1(1); Chaffinch 1(1). Totals: 21 birds ringed from 9 species and 31 birds retrapped from 6 species, making 52 birds processed from 9 species.

For once, my highlight of the day was a Blue Tit: S395508 was ringed as a juvenile on the 6th July 2016. It has been retrapped on four further occasions, the last being today: making it 7.5 years since it was ringed. The oldest known Blue Tit was 9 years and 8 months since ringing, so it has a couple of years to go yet to beat the record. It is four years since we last recaptured the bird. Every capture has been at Somerford Common, so one wonders where it has been in the interim.

Having started on a sad Chaffinch story, I am going to finish on another. The retrapped Chaffinch that I processed was ringed three years ago. We are very careful about ringing Chaffinch, because of FPV. If there is any sign of the infection, anything other than fresh, healthy, pink legs, we do not ring them. Unfortunately, since ringing this bird has developed the disease. Both legs are affected. I decided not to try to remove the ring, as this would almost certainly have caused some damage to the bird above and beyond what it is currently having to deal with. One thing about FPV: it does not seem to adversely affect the birds until it reaches the end stages and it starts to lose the limbs. I actually measured the wing and weighed the bird: both were well within expected norms. The bird weighed in at 21 grams: the same weight as the healthy bird that we ringed during the session. Some ringers choose not to ring Chaffinch at all, in case they get FPV. My personal view is that if we catch them, and they are clean and showing no signs of infection, we should ring them. Even if they subsequently develop FPV, the ring is not going to adversely impact any more than the infection and, if one wants to potentially study survival in birds affected by FPV, there has to be a means of identifying the individual birds.

Anyway, we started closing the nets at 11:30, as numbers had tailed off again, took down the nets and packed away the ringing station and were off site by 12:30.

With storms raging all around, I was interested to know how we would fare (i.e. how the birds have fared) when we arrived at the site. The first thing I saw on arriving was not weather damage but another piece of petty vandalism of the front gate:

This is the third time that this gate has been vandalised, as far as I am aware. The bar along the top is continually being broken off, for no good reason. It is there to stop the gate flapping backwards and forwards. Vandalism is a regular feature at this nature reserve: from dog owners ripping down signs asking them to keep their dogs on a lead and to clean up after them to trashing the lovely, old Shooter’s Hut deep in the wood and the car park is continually blighted by fly-tipping. Rant over!

I was joined for the session by Laura and her two boys, Adam and Daniel, Teresa and Rosie dropped in to help set up before heading off to work at the Wildlife Trust. We set the usual nets along rides R28 and R38 and I set sound lures for a variety of winter visitors. Unfortunately, it didn’t attract in a single bird from any of those species. We did see a few Redwing flying around but that was about it. Having caught 62 birds from 12 species there, working solo the last time I ringed there, I was hoping for a decent catch. Unfortunately those hopes were quickly dashed.

In fact, between 8.30 and 11.00 we caught only 13 birds: Blue Tit 1(1); Great Tit 2(1); Coal Tit 1; Long-tailed Tit (3); Wren 1; Robin 1; Blackbird (1); Goldcrest (1). Totals: 6 birds ringed from 5 species and 7 birds retrapped from 5 species, making 13 birds processed from 8 species. Ironically, whilst we did catch 57 birds in Webb’s Wood on Monday, it was from only 6 species.

That is not to say that we didn’t have a good time of it: just lots more time to chat, plus plenty of time to focus on the birds we did catch. One of the more difficult birds to age are Coal Tits:

Coal Tit, Periparus ater

The key ageing criterion is the colour of the greater coverts:

The trick is in identifying the difference between the outer, older feathers, which tend to be browner with a brownish / yellow distal fringing and the inner, newer, feathers that are darker, greyer with greyish distal fringing. The outer three feathers of this bird were what we used to identify this bird as a juvenile.

We were treated to more Ravens flying around and croaking, Carrion Crows croaking in a higher key and a Song Thrush that sat in the tree adjacent to our ringing station and refused to put a cork in it nearly all morning. 

One other interesting birding event: a Kestrel hunting within the wood. We saw it on several occasions throughout the morning and it was definitely hunting.

We met a lot of dog walkers this morning and, for once, they all had their dogs on leads – possibly to ensure that they didn’t get absolutely plastered in mud. Whilst not as much of a quagmire as Webb’s Wood, ride R38 was extremely muddy and, by the time we had walked back and forth along it a dozen times, it was an absolute morass. 

At 11:00, after a couple of empty rounds, we decided to call it a day and took down the nets. With two teams working at it, we had the nets down and everything packed away by 11:30.

An interesting December: despite the weather we managed to get in as many full sessions (17) as we did in December 2022.  The total numbers were relatively similar but the make up was very different.

This year we had two fewer species than last year but three of the species in 2022 were Buzzard, Barn Owl and Tawny Owl, when I ringed four of the former and one each of the latter two species at the RSPCA Oak & Furrows Recovery Centre.  Anyway, in our catch this year, missing last year, are Bullfinch, Linnet, Meadow Pipit, Sparrowhawk and Tree Sparrow.  The addition of Tree Sparrow this year is down to Jonny taking over monitoring a number of sites containing their nesting colonies and taking on ringing around these sites. Missing from our catch this year, as well as the three rehab species, were Green Woodpecker, House Sparrow, Jay, Pied Wagtail and Starling.

As well as this, the balance of catches is quite astonishing.  In the ascendant in December 2023 are:

• Blue Tit: 122 ringed in 2023 vs 80 in 2022, whereas the numbers retrapped were very similar (81 vs 85).
• Great Tit: 106 processed vs 58 processed, with 56 ringed in 2023 – nearly the same as the total processed in 2022.
• Lesser Redpoll: 20 ringed vs 2.
• Redwing: 129 processed vs 64 (funnily enough, Jonny and I had coffee and a chat on Friday and were actually moaning about how few Redwing we were currently catching!)

In the descendant in December 2023 are:

• Blackbird: 28 processed in 2022 vs 17 this December
• Goldfinch: 40 vs 17 
• Long-tailed Tit: 32 vs 17, with the key difference being only 7 ringed this year vs 19 in 2022.
• Robin: 22 ringed last December, just 11 this.
• Wren: 17 ringed last December, only 2 this.

I would love to know the reasons behind these changes. The only one that I have any knowledge about is the Goldfinch numbers: it was too windy to open the nets in my garden this December, which contributed 11 Goldfinch to the total last December and none this month.

With this being the first dry day, with tolerable wind speeds for mist netting, since our Boxing Day session, I decided to run a session at Webb’s Wood to celebrate the New Year. There was a good team turnout: Ellie (my longest serving / longest suffering C-permit holder), Teresa and Adam for ringing & extracting duties; Laura for extracting & scribing duties, Andy for scribing duties & Mark (to give me someone to talk to, because everybody else was doing all of the work). The whole team joined in with setting up and taking down the nets in what can only be described as a quagmire. Needless to say, the only person who managed to actually measure their length in the mud was yours truly: via a bramble tripwire! Fortunately, that was right at the end of the session, because I was very mucky afterwards.

We met at 7:30 and, despite a bit of messing around with the last two nets, with shelf strings breaking on both, one immediately retrievable thanks to Laura’s dexterity, the other having to be replaced, we had all nets open by 8:30 and were immediately catching birds for processing.

It wasn’t the most exciting catch: unfortunately there were no Lesser Redpoll to be seen this time, and neither did any Redwing put in an appearance. However, we did catch a decent number of birds, mainly Blue and Great Tits attracted in by the feeding station. Despite the lack of variety, Adam got to ring his first ever Chaffinch and Goldcrest and Teresa to ring her second ever Goldcrest, so I think they were happy with their morning’s work.

The list for the session was: Blue Tit 15(9); Great Tit 13(10); Coal Tit 3(2); Blackbird 1; Goldcrest 3; Chaffinch 1. Totals: 36 birds ringed from 6 species and 21 birds retrapped from 3 species, making 57 birds processed from 6 species.

Whilst the rest of the team were extracting birds at 9:30, Mark and I had the pleasure of watching a Raven circling around above our ringing site, calling constantly. It then perched in the top of one of the taller conifers left at the site and we had lovely views as it continued its calling from its perch. It then flew off and a few minutes later we had a pair of Ravens fly past: whether it had been calling for its mate and this was the result, or not, is open to conjecture. What we did see, a little later on, was a Raven flying through with what looked like nesting material in its beak. They nest early, so it is entirely feasible that what we saw this morning was all part of pair bonding and preparation for nesting.

At about 10:00 we were treated to an overflying Goshawk. We know that they arrived in the area a few years ago, and I am aware of two sites where they are thought to have nested last year. I am hoping to find the nests this year and see about monitoring them and their young (once I have filled out the appropriate paperwork for a Schedule 1 licence). 

With the weather turning decidedly chilly, the wind increasing in strength and, perhaps more decisively, the catch numbers having died off, we decided to pack away the nets, carrying out the last round at 11:20. We had everything packed away and were off site by just before 12:30.