Friday 17 December 2010

Gull Grabbing.

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I was dropping Ciaran off in Preston this afternoon, so we decided we’d take a quick look at the docks for Black Headed Gull rings. When we arrived we were greeted by lots of gulls which were eager to have a feed before they went off to roost. It was obvious the gulls were going to be easy to catch, so we decided to catch a few…. after 1hr 30mins of catching/ringing, a few turned into 41 new birds & 1 control – that of a Norwegian ringed bird!

For any ring readers at Preston Docks, or birders who are going to see the Iceland Gull, who maybe interested in giving ring reading a go. All the rings start with – EX541**. All the juvs were ringed on the left leg, the reason for this is because there is a Danish ringed juvy, ringed on the right leg & it'll allow Ciaran to easily pick this bird out, and hopefully read the full ring code.

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5 comments:

  1. Hey Kane!

    What did you read on the danish one? Nice work anyway! We have been ringing about 750 gull since october here in Copenhagen!
    Jesper Brinkmann

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  2. Hi Jesper,

    Good to hear from you! Ciaran has only managed to read part of the ring - so up to now he's got 6J-00, hopefully over the next few days he'll be able to read the full ring code! We'll keep you posted ;-)

    Cheers Kane.

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  3. Morning, are you using a hand held net for the Black-heads or just nabbing mid-flight as the come to bread? They are far more wary of both methods up here!!

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  4. Hi - All the gulls we catch are taken either out of the air (by hand) or caught on the ground, again by hand. None are caught by nets - they seem really wary of nets. You had a good garden session, especially for Blue Tit!! Cheers Kane

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  5. Think I will give the BH Gull a shot in the new year, you've inspired me!

    Blue tits were a mare, I know a few ringers that just release them un-ringed however I like to monitor my local birds via retraps.

    Have a good Christmas and all the best for 2011... Good ringing!

    Dave

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