I had planned to start my CES on Saturday but, unfortunately, I had to postpone it. For the last couple of months I have been afflicted by severe pains, muscle cramps and spasms in my legs, which has restricted my mobility and, on some mornings, I just cannot move, leading to cancellation of several sessions. So, at 5:50 on Saturday morning, I had to call the team and tell them that I wasn’t going to be able cancel. Doubly unfortunately, Annie was going to join me for the session, the first time for several months and I really hated having to put her off..
I managed to rearrange for Bank Holiday Monday. Fortunately, this time the painkillers actually kicked in quickly and I was able to move a bit. I was also joined by my original two trainees: both Jonny (now an independent A-permit holder) and Ellie (a C-permit holder) gave up their Monday morning to help out their old trainer. We set up the CES nets in their usual places:
The weather was cold, and it wasn’t the largest catch. There was a lot of bird song from all over the site but they just weren’t really moving. We heard plenty of Cetti’s Warbler, Willow Warbler and Chiffchaff plus our first chance of the year to get to grips with the difference between Blackcap and Garden Warbler.
The first couple of rounds produced our first Garden Warblers of the year:
At just after 10:00 the noise level went up considerably when we were, unexpectedly, joined by the Mansfield clan: Steph , Stuart, Isobel and Bea. The only one missing was Lillie, away on a sleepover with friends. Steph got to ring a few birds and Bea got to practice her handling and releasing skills which, for a three-year-old, are extremely good. The weather did turn quite a lot colder, seeing off the family, and prompted us to take down the nets. The catch wasn’t as good as I was hoping for: the birds were there, they just weren’t moving around.
The list for the day was: Long-tailed Tit (3); Wren (1); Dunnock 1(2); Robin 1(1); Blackbird (1); Blackcap 5(3); Garden Warbler 3; Chiffchaff 1(2). Totals: 11 birds ringed from 5 species and 13 birds retrapped from 7 species, making 24 birds processed from 8 species.
This time of year is pretty quiet in the woodlands. I have removed the winter feeding stations and the winter visitors have left, so no Lesser Redpoll or Siskin groups. Our resident tit flocks have split up, pairing up for breeding, as have our other residents. Summer visitors are arriving: mainly males setting up territories, and proclaiming their ownership at ever opportunity.
What is good about this time of year is that the pressure is off. As mentioned in my last post, as a trainer you have more time to introduce your trainees to the delights of sexing sexually monomorphic species: Dunnocks, Wrens, Robins etc. It also enables them to become comfortable with the differing stages of brood patches. In today’s catch we had females that were just starting to develop the brood patch, others with a fully cleared brood patch and a female Blackcap and Robin, both of which were definitely ready for brooding eggs.
I was joined for the morning by Miranda and Rosie, Rosie leaving for work just before 9:00, and the Steph arrived to spend a couple of hours with us as well, before leaving to pick up Bea.
As implied, it wasn’t our biggest catch but the boundaries have definitely changed: Blue Tit (1); Wren (1); Robin 2; Blackbird (2); Blackcap 4; Chiffchaff 7(1); Goldcrest 1(1). Totals: 14 birds ringed from 4 species and 6 birds retrapped from 5 species, making 20 birds processed from 7 species.
What was really rather odd about the session was that we had Willow Warblers singing all over the area, but did not catch a single one.
The weather itself was not great: no rain, no wind, but at one point the temperature suddenly dipped and it became very cold, so we packed up and tried to leave: only to find our exit blocked by a rather large lorry picking up the last of the timber stacks, that were supposed to have been removed by the end of March. It was a minor hold up.
Today we had a ringing demonstration arranged within Ravensroost Wood for the Swindon Wildlife Group, affiliated with the Wiltshire Wildlife Trust. We knew that there would be a good turnout, as it was sold out twice over. I was joined by Jonny, David and Anna for the morning: just as well as I am unable to walk much at the moment and they could do all the hard work whilst I sat, drank coffee and did the presentations. We set up 7 x 18m and 2 x 12m nets split between rides R28 and R38:
Coupe V was coppiced this winter, with coupe X at the 6 year growth stage, making a decent backdrop to the open land. Coupes U1 and T2 are at that stage where they are above head height but still seem a bit sparse. The other main change is that the rides were opened last year, to make them wider and drier, approximately 2m wide.
We had people arriving for 9:00, so didn’t start horribly early, meeting at 6:30 and getting the nets up and open by 7:45, when we caught the first bird. As the visitors started to arrive we were lucky enough to get a reasonable catch of birds. I always forget, because we handle so many birds and see so many close up, just how exciting it is for general members of the public to see birds up close.
When they are getting excellent views of Blue Tit, Wren, Blackcap and Chiffchaff, learning identification and ageing techniques, and how to safely hold and release birds, it becomes an exciting event for them. As, at this time of year, we can also show them how to identify the sexes of sexually monomorphic species. With Blue Tit, Robin and Blackcap showing well-developed brood patches and male Blue Tits, Blackcaps and Wrens with the well developed engorgement of their cloaca, their cloacal protuberances, to use the appropriate language, their “willies” for the children amongst the adults, the audience was extremely satisfied with what they saw,
That is just as well as, unfortunately, at 10:30 the wind really started to get up and I had to decide that the conditions were too dangerous and we shut the nets and called an early halt to the demonstration.
It was a shame, as there was so much bird song around: particularly excellent numbers of Willow Warbler and Chiffchaff and, with better weather conditions, we could well have had an excellent catch. In the event we caught: Blue Tit 2(1); Wren (2); Robin (1); Blackbird 1; Blackcap 6; Chiffchaff (1). Totals: 9 birds ringed from 3 species and 5 birds retrapped from 4 species, making 14 birds processed from 6 species.
So, despite the low numbers, everybody thanked us for giving them such an enjoyable, educational and exciting session. The team then spent the next hour extracting nets from foliage (thank goodness for the absence of Blackthorn, and the abundance of Hazel) and packing away. We left site at about 11:30, disappointed that we couldn’t do more, delighted that the paying public felt they had their money’s worth (the money goes to the Swindon Wildlife Group, who disburse it according to whatever their current priorities are – sometimes that is us, not today however, but I am certainly not complaining, I like working with them and they have been very generous to me and the team in the recent past.)
Just a quick update: since this session we have had more emails than ever before thanking us for giving them the experience, the detailed explanations on ageing and sexing but, particularly, for enabling the children to get hands on experience of holding and releasing those few birds where we allowed it. Chiffchaffs are off limits because they are so delicate.
A bittersweet morning this morning: we had a quiet but interesting session. Bittersweet because it is the last session that Tanya will be joining me, as she is moving to Shropshire to start a new job, having finished her traineeship with the Wiltshire Wildlife Trust. Along with Rosie, she has turned up for nearly every session, to help me get set up before heading off to work, with barely a chance to process any birds. I shall always be grateful. If any ringing trainer in Shropshire is reading this and is looking for a capable, willing helper with a lovely personality to go with it, drop me a line. It will be shame to lose her from the ringing community.
We were joined by Miranda for the morning, which helped make setting up very straightforward:
The ringing station was next door to the Whitworth Building which, for the first time in ages, had the added bonus of being open for most of the morning, offering facilities not often enjoyed by the female members of the team.
Just after eight we were joined by Claire and her children. Zara is quite remarkable: birds of many species will happily sit on her hand far longer than I have seen with any other individual. We are all used to some birds sitting there until they realise they have been released, particularly Bullfinch, but with Zara it seems that virtually every bird is comfortable sitting there until they are prompted to fly off. Perhaps it is the size and shape of her hand that reminds them of being in the nest.
We were serenaded by the Curlew flying around the plateau and calling with their bubbling song. I am pretty certain that at one point we had a Cuckoo fly across the site. Someone passing by swore blind it was a raptor, because of its swept back wings, but Cuckoos can look that way as well. Unfortunately it had disappeared by the time I got my binoculars out of the case. We didn’t hear it calling but hopefully next time!
We had a quiet session, just a few birds each round, but it was enjoyable. The list was: Great Tit 1; Wren (1); Dunnock (1); Robin 1(1); Blackbird (1); Blackcap 2; Chiffchaff 4(1); Willow Warbler 1; House Sparrow 2(1). Totals; 11 birds ringed from 6 species and 6 birds retrapped from 6 species, making 17 birds processed from 9 species.
We were pleasantly surprised with the number of butterflies around: Peacock, Small White, Orange Tip, Brimstone and Speckled Wood were all in evidence in the field.
Claire and crew disappeared at just after 11:00. Miranda and I took a couple more birds out of the net as we closed them up at 12:00, took down and left site by 13:00.
A very pleasant session at Red Lodge this morning. I had David, Rob, Rosie and Tanya turn up to help us set up. We all met at 6:30 and set a decent number of nets, as shown below:
As you can see, we have moved from the winter feeding station area and set the ringing station up just to the west of the main net rides. Once we finished setting up, Rosie, Tanya and Rob all had to disappear off to work just before 9:00. David stayed for the whole morning: a morning during which he extracted his 500th bird from mist nets.
We were joined for the morning again by Claire and her two children, Samuel and Zara, plus local resident Darren and his daughter, Esmae. Esmae soon sent her dad packing, and we had the children with us until just after 11:00. This morning we started teaching them how to take wing length measurements. I was impressed at how quickly they picked it up, regularly matching our measurements, or being within 1mm of it. I have a young person’s training endorsement on my ringing permit, and have been DBS checked, so I am fully authorised to work with children and vulnerable adults. The children (and parents) left at 11:00.
One of the nice things about this time of year, if you are a trainer, is that we are between winter migrants, who have moved off, and the summer migrants who have just started arriving, so the numbers are low. This gives time to work with trainees and expand their skills without the pressure of numbers to be processed. With birds coming into breeding condition, it gives time to go through the difficulties of assessing brood patch development and whether or not a bird is showing a cloacal protuberance (the engorgement of the male’s cloaca, prior to its use as the sexual organ).
We spent the morning being serenaded primarily by Chiffchaffs and the odd Blackcap. Funnily enough, that’s a reasonable description of our catch this morning. We caught: Blue Tit 8; Great Tit 1; Coal Tit 1; Long-tailed Tit 3; Wren 3(2); Robin 2(2); Song Thrush 1(1); Blackbird 1; Blackcap 4; Chiffchaff 3(2). Totals: 27 birds ringed from 10 species and 7 birds retrapped from 4 species, making 34 birds processed from 10 species.
Although this is only 34 birds, it is actually the largest April catch that we have ever had in Red Lodge:
No guesses why there are no April records for 2020, but I don’t know what I was doing in 2018.
David’s dad, Trevor, as usual, arrived in time to help us get packed away. We, as usual, were running 30 minutes late, as birds kept coming into the nets even as we were shutting them down. Between the three of us we had the nets cleared away and left site by 13:00.
Regular readers will know that the area around my winter feeding station was scalped at the beginning of the winter. I got around this by moving the feeding station closer to the standing vegetation and we had reasonable catches over the winter.
Today I planned to carry out my ringing activities in my usual summer net locations. The net ride just up from the ringing station area is used year round and was set up first, as usual. Two of my key net ride areas are highlighted in white on the following photo and this is what I was expecting to find. The main area cannot be seen from the ringing station, as there is a steep hill and some encroaching foliage that hides the view.
When we got into view of the additional ringing areas, this is what we found. Area 1 now looks like this:
Area 2 now looks like this:
It was highly disappointing, and I will now have to find an alternative area for this year’s ringing efforts.
To cap it all: the dry day we were promised disappeared at about 9:00. It wasn’t heavy rain: it was light but persistent. We had hoped that it was a passing shower, and it varied in intensity and at one point it seemed as though it would clear. It seemed that every time we did a round it would start again. The last two birds out of the nest were a retrapped Blue Tit and Great Tit, which we extracted as part of our take down. As luck would have it, once everything was down and we were packing the stuff into my car, the sun came out!
The fact is, though, that we were not catching many birds. The majority were caught in the one net ride retained from our winter set. In that ride we caught our first two Willow Warblers of the year:
Male Willow Warbler
The small catch was Blue Tit (1); Great Tit (1); Robin 1; Chiffchaff 4; Willow Warbler 2. Totals: 7 birds ringed from 3 species and 2 birds retrapped from 2 species, making 9 birds processed from 5 species.
I always feel somewhat guilty when sessions go wrong. getting people out of bed early, driving to join you and help you get set up, and then not being able to deliver the birds. Today I was joined by Rosie, briefly, Miranda and Tanya and, a little later on, Claire and her children came along to see how it was going. At least Tanya and Miranda got to process their first ever Willow Warblers.
We were away from site by 10:30, rather disappointed. I had a quick reconnaissance and think that I have found an alternative area to replace the devastation. Over the weekend I will have a more detailed look and establish the net rides.
Miranda and I met at Ravensroost Wood at 6:30 this morning. This session was planned for Wednesday but the forecast was, for once, accurate, and Wednesday was wet and windy, so we moved it to today. My intention was to set 11 nets but, due to a problem with the 12m net I took with me, and an oak tree getting in the way of an 18m net, we ended up with just the 9 x 18m nets. After faffing around for far too long trying to get the 12m net operational, we had all of the nets open by 7:30 and started catching straight away: the obligatory Wren flying in and getting horribly entangled in an unopened net to start the ball rolling. You can almost always guarantee that the first bird caught in my woodland sites will be either a Wren or a Robin. Whilst setting up the nets, we were treated to a lot of bird song. Key amongst the choristers were the Willow Warblers: there were at least half-a-dozen singing.
Needless to say, we didn’t catch a single one.
On the west side I set 3 lures: Chiffchaff / Blackcap / Chiffchaff and on the east side I set 2 lures: Chiffchaff and Blackcap. Naturally, the first round did not produce any of those species. Instead it produced 3 Blue Tits, a Great Tit, 2 Wrens and 2 Long-tailed Tits. Unfortunately, I managed to let one of the Blue Tits escape from the bag as I was getting it out to process it. The Long-tailed Tits were caught in the same net, just a few feet apart, but on opposite sides. I guessed that they were a pair, one getting caught flying in, the other getting caught coming back to find its mate. Sure enough, when processed one was a male and the other a female with a well-developed brood patch. We released them together and they flew off in the same direction together, helping cement my opinion.
Whilst processing these I heard the unmistakeable song of a Mistle Thrush. We only got glimpses at that point and, like the Willow Warblers, it never got near our nets. The bird stayed around all morning and about 10:00 we got some excellent views as it flew around the tops of the guard trees left in the newly coppiced coupe. Mistle Thrush is a rare catch for us. In Wiltshire in 2020, the latest for which data is currently available, none were either ringed or recaptured. In the two prior years the totals were 4 in 2019 and 2 in 2018.
Soon after the Mistle Thrush moved on, I saw a Hare running across the coppiced area. Unfortunately for Miranda, he disappeared before she got to see it. I have seen them on the bridle path that splits Ravensroost, and on one of the forest tracks at Somerford Common, but it is still surprising to see them in such a habitat.
At 10:00 we had a little fall of Chiffchaff hit the net, 5 of the 6 processed this morning. We didn’t have lots of birds at a time 3 0r 4, occasionally 5, but that gave us plenty of time for me to introduce Miranda to the vagaries of sexing sexually monomorphic species. Fortunately, the Blue Tits, Chiffchaffs, Dunnock and Wrens we caught were all showing excellent signs of their sexuality: mainly males, it has to be said.
Our last proper round, at 11:15 turned up a superb pair of Nuthatch. Again, I use the word “pair” quite deliberately. They came out of the same net as the Long-tailed Tits, were actually closer together than they had been, one was male, the other female. As with the Long-tailed Tits, we processed them and released them together. They flew off in the same direction. Unfortunately, the male flew straight back into the net. The female stayed close by calling, and waited until I released the male again, whereby they then flew off in the same direction. Again, I am pretty certain they have paired for breeding this year. Actually, one of the nice points about it was that they were both unringed. I like recapturing birds, it is where the science is, but we do seem to have been catching rather few new Nuthatches, particularly at Ravensroost. In the previous 2 years we only ringed 2 in Ravensroost in each year. Let’s hope we can get back to the heady days of 2017, when we ringed 10!
The list for the day was: Nuthatch 2; Blue Tit 1(1); Great Tit 2; Long-tailed Tit 2; Wren 4(2); Dunnock (1); Robin 1(2); Song Thrush 1; Blackbird (2); Blackcap 3; Chiffchaff 5(1). Totals: 21 birds ringed from 9 species and 9 birds retrapped from 6 species, making 30 birds processed from 11 species.
The recaptured Chiffchaff was ringed as an adult in Ravensroost Wood in July 2019, so it is at least 3 years old. That’s a year longer than the birds typical lifespan (BTO Bird Facts) but it needs another nearly 8 years to beat the longevity record. I am intrigued by Chiffchaffs: I would like to know how many have given up migration and remain in the UK overwinter. There are areas around the Cotswold Water Park where they can be found year round. It would be good to know if these birds are “our” breeding birds, or migrants talking advantage of our milder winter climate, as is the case with overwintering Blackcaps.
It was a really cold morning, without being frosty. We were both getting very chilled by the time we started packing up at about 11:45. Ironically, that’s when the sun came out and warmed the place up! Such is life! We were away from site just after 12:45.
It was one of those days: starting at minus 2oC when I left the house at 6:00, getting to 4oC by the time we had our nets open and positively balmy by 11:00. I was joined by Tanya for the morning and Claire and her children joined us at 7:30 until 11:00, so the children could continue to familiarise themselves with the birds prior to, perhaps, starting ringing.
We set our usual three net rides and had them open just after 7:15. All around we could hear birds singing, particularly Blackcap and Chiffchaff. I put on lures for both species and we sat back and waited – and waited, and waited. Eventually the Chiffchaff started to respond to the lures with a couple hitting the net at 8:50. The first Blackcap, and our first of the Spring, arrived at 9:20:
Female Blackcap: our first of this Spring
Unfortunately it just never got busy. However, it did enable me to work with Tanya as she started on extracting birds for the first time. As with her ringing and processing, she took to it like a duck to water (appropriate metaphor time).
We didn’t catch much: Wren (2); Dunnock 1(2); Blackbird (1); Blackcap 2; Chiffchaff 5. Totals: 8 birds ringed from 3 species and 5 birds retrapped from 3 species, making 13 birds processed from 5 species.
Given how much bird song there was, it was a disappointing result. There seemed to be birds singing from every corner of the site. Along with the Blackcap and Chiffchaff, there were Wren, Blackbird, Cetti’s Warbler and Green Woodpecker calling / singing. Somewhat surprisingly, as we were packing away the nets in the wildlife refuge, I could swear that I heard a Whitethroat singing away in the bushes alongside the stream. That would be astonishing: the earliest that we have caught a Whitethroat was back on the 19th April last year at Langford Lakes.
Tanya and I closed the nets at 11:30, took down and left site by 12:15.
An interesting month. The absolute highlight has to be the second ever Dipper on WWRG rings, caught and ringed by Jonny on the Bybrook:
This is closely followed by the return from Cornwall of our leg-tagged Curlew,. which has been seen in the Cotswold Water Park and back at Blakehill Farm. I have put out a plea on Twitter for a photo: hopefully someone will be kind enough to send me one. The results for this month were:
So, 90 birds fewer than last March but also 6 sessions fewer. That was primarily down to Jonny being unavailable for the last two weekends of the month, and me becoming a cripple for the last week-and-a-half and cancelling a couple of sessions. Therefore, the averages are all higher. Coincidentally, we also ringed four more species. Clearly the Dipper is the highlight but there were certainly other interesting numbers. I finally managed to get to Brown’s Farm and, whilst we only caught a few birds, 13 of them were Yellowhammers. 14 of the 28 Yellowhammers came from Jonny’s site at East Tytherton, with the final one from one of his Sutton Benger sites.. Other species caught this year but not last were: 2 x Woodpigeon and a Collared Dove (all in Alice’s back garden); 2 Cetti’s Warbler at Langford Lakes; a Brambling at Biss Wood (since we had the first one turn up at Sutton Benger in January 2018, we seem to be getting the odd one turn up at each of our woods in turn, a couple in total each year); Grey Wagtail, caught in the same net as the Dipper on the Bybrook; Green Woodpecker at Alice’s Hogacre Eco Park site.
Missing from last year were Bullfinch and Linnet. On Linnets: as I was taking down the nets at Brown’s Farm, the farmer came down the track and put up a flock of about 30 Linnets from the hedgerow just a few metres away from where my nets ended! One more net and who knows! Also of note, the reduced number of Blackcaps. However, of the 12 Blackcaps caught in March last year, they were all caught in the last 2 weeks of the month and, in fact, 2 were caught on the 29th March and 9 on the 31st March, so if Jonny and I had been active in the last two weeks of the month, who knows!
For those interested in the figures: this has been our best Q1 by a long way since the North Wilts group split away at the beginning of 2013:
This was based on our astonishing January, and then both February and March being comparable with the previous year.
I decided that I would have a lie-in this morning, so I arranged for us to meet at 6:30, rather than earlier. Rosie and Tanya joined me to help set up the nets, and do a bit of ringing before heading off to work. The weather was surprisingly cold at first but it soon warmed up, and the weather was perfect for the whole session: clear skies and virtually no wind.
It was Rosie who was the first to notice the bubbling call of the Curlew, but it then continued for a couple of hours as they flew around the plateau advertising their presence. We know that the Curlew leg tagged at Blakehill last year has been seen at the Water Park over the last couple of weeks and hope to see it back on the plateau pretty soon. Chiffchaffs were calling all around the site, so we were hopeful of catching a few.
We only set six nets:
To be honest, the bulk of the catch came in the three-way net setup. I set lures for Linnet on the single 18m net; Linnet and Blackcap on the double 18m net and Chiffchaff on the 3-way net. Just behind the Whitworth Building (the building to the right of the single 18m net) is a couple of concrete slabs and some additional rubble: the remains of an old out-building. As someone had seen a Wheatear on the site in the last week, I decided to have a go to see if we could add to the Wheatear we caught last autumn. I set two walk-in Potter traps, liberally baited with mealworms and with a Wheatear call lure playing. Unfortunately, there were no takers. Equally, the 18m net produced no Linnets but two Chiffchaffs and the double 18m net produced no Linnet or Blackcap but one Chiffchaff and a Song Thrush.
Anna joined us at about 8:00: after having provided the taxi service for her sister, and stayed with me for the rest of the morning. So I have help setting up and help taking down: spoilt? Moi?
The first round produced a Dunnock, a House Sparrow and a Wren. The Dunnock and the House Sparrow used up the last of my string of size B rings. In between rounds we were treated to a few early insects: a Small Tortoiseshell and a couple of Brimstone, plus a couple of Buff-tailed Bumblebees and a Common Carder Bee:
The next round produced another four House Sparrows. I went to my ring supply box to get the next string of 100 rings: nowhere to be found! I knew there were none at home. Panic stations. I phoned Johnny, but he was miles away and busy at his East Tytherton site. Then I phoned Steph, fortunately she had enough for me to steal some from her, so I raced off to her place, just over the border in Gloucestershire, and took 20 from her stock, so we could process these birds.
Rosie and Tanya had to leave just as I got back with the rings, so they missed out on ringing their first House Sparrows. Anna and I continued until 11:30. We were joined for a while by Wayne Clinch and his wife, which reminded me that I haven’t submitted my 2021 moth records yet (Wayne is the Wiltshire macro-moth recorder), so I had better pull my finger out and get them to him.
The list for the day was: Blue Tit (1); Wren 1; Dunnock 1(1); Robin 2; Song Thrush 1; Chiffchaff 4(1); House Sparrow 9. Totals: 18 birds ringed from 6 species and 3 birds retrapped from 3 species, making 21 birds processed from 7 species.
It is our equal best catch of House Sparrow at this site and our best March Chiffchaff catch at Blakehill.
Ringing In The Braydon Forest & Beyond 