Roosting.

It's good to be back home and out ringing so soon after landing back from Romania last night! This evening along with Steve, Jenny & Justin Garner from the South Manchester RG we planned to target a Swallow roost at the local reedbed. We arrived at 19:45 & soon had the nets up. The roost built to around 150-200 birds as they quickly descended into the reeds. Not long after, a net round bagged 76 Swallows, 1 Sand Martin, 1 Wren & 1 Willow Warbler!


Steve has had several attempts at this roost over the last 2 weeks & now has caught over 230 new birds, recapped 2 (from previous years) & controlled 1. Depending on the weather hopefully we can have another go at the roost later in the week.

Another mixed bag!

A good week with 86 new birds ringed + 1 recap.

Garden ringing

18/06/2009 - Set a few traps on the garden lawn targetting Starling - catching 4 birds.

19/06/2009 - Mist netting in the garden resulting in the following birds caught - 1 Blackbird, 1 Starling, 1 Blue Tit, 1 Robin, 1 Greenfinch.

20/06/2009 - Mist netting again, catching - 1 Goldfinch, 1 Bullfinch, 1 Blackbird and 1 Starling.



WWT Martin Mere

20/06/2009 - checked a few of the Tree Sparrow boxes resulting in 13 pulli being ringed. Also a brood of 5 Great Tit & 4 Wren ringed.

Atherton Farm

18/06/2009 - 13 Swallow pulli ringed.

Windermere area.

21/06/2009 - Visiting various farms ringing 30 Swallows (24 pulli + 6 adults). Also 5 Mute Swans, 1 Mallard, 1 Treecreeper, 1 Grey Wagtail and 1 recap Dipper.

Weekly totals -

Wren - 4
Swallow - 43
Blue Tit - 1
Great Tit - 5
Starling - 6
Blackbird - 2
Robin - 1
Goldfinch - 1
Greenfinch - 1
Bullfinch - 1
Tree Sparrow - 13
Treecreeper - 1
Grey Wagtail - 1
Dipper - 1 recap
Mute Swan - 5
Mallard - 1 = 86 new & 1 recap.

Swallow and Lapwing.

Out with Steve last night checking our Kestrel box at Botany Bay Woods in Grt Manchester. Unfortunately, despite a few sightings of the Kestrels sat in the entrance hole of the box - it was unoccupied .

We decided to check to see if any Swallows were ready for ringing. Most of the nests contained eggs but one nest had ringable chicks.

Then a quick check in the fields to look for Lapwing, finding two chicks.

Update.

18/05/2009 - 26/05/2009.

Just back from ringing in the Lake District so thought I would provide an update for the ringing that has been carried out over the last week or so.

19th May saw us checking our boxes in Atherton Woods and ringing most of the pulli - 132 Blue Tits (2 recaps adults), 36 Great Tits and 8 Nuthatch were ringed.

Then early morning on the 20th we did a bit of mist netting at one of our reed bed sites, catching 7 Reed Bunting (1 control), 3 Sedge Warbler, 2 Starling, 3 Song Thrush and 1 Mallard. A male Cuckoo was mingling very close to our nets, but unfortunately not close enough!

21st & 22nd ringing in my Atherton garden, yielded 14 birds - 1 Robin, 9 Starling, 1 Wren, 2 Goldfinch and 1 Blackbird.

On the 23rd a team of us headed up to the Lake District to carry out ringing, nest recording and atlas work around the Windermere area.

On the 23rd we set up to catch at a river in Ambleside and after a short while we were rewarded with - 3 Dippers and 2 Goosander.

The 24th produced - 2 Grey Wagtail, 3 Dipper, 1 Dunnock and 1 Mallard.

The morning on the 25th was spent catching Mute Swans at Bowness on Windermere. 19 new Mute Swans ringed along with 1 Whooper Swan and 1 Canada Goose. A brood of 5 Blackbird also ringed.

2 Swallow ringed on the evening of 25th.


Thanks to all ringers involved over the last week and also thanks to the Landowners for permission to accessing their land.

Full totals.

Blue Tit - 132 + (2 retrap)

Great Tit - 36

Nuthatch - 8

Reed Bunting - 6 + (1 control)

Sedge Warbler - 3

Goldfinch - 2

Wren - 1

Dunnock - 2

Robin - 1

Blackbird - 11

Song Thrush - 3

Starling - 11

Wood Pigeon - 1

Mallard - 2

Swallow - 2

Grey Wagtail - 2

Dipper - 7

Goosander - 2

Canada Goose - 1

Mute Swan - 19

Whooper Swan - 1 = 253.

Herons

After our last failed attempt at ringing some Grey Heron pulli (due to them all being too small) we left it a further two weeks before going back into the heronry. Yesterday (Sunday 19th April) four of us armed with rings, royal mail bags and noses for strong smells headed in!!



Thanks to the expert climbing by Steve Christmas (my trainer) 11 heron chicks were lowered to the ground to be ringed.


Before we went into the heronry, me and my friend/fellow ringer Craig Brookes decided that we would have a look around the site for nests/chicks etc. I decided to check a small shed in the farm yard where Swallows have bred in recent years. As I went in a Swallow darted over my shoulder and out through the door but I could hear another still in there. I can't describe what happened next, due to it all happening too quick! But somehow I raised my hand and caught a female Swallow!!!!!

Other birds ringed in the week 13th April - 19th.

Swallow - 1
Goldfinch - 3 (Including the 100th Goldfinch to be ringed in the garden since December!)
Starling - 6
Collard Dove - 1 (A fledgling from next doors satellite dish!)
Wood Pigeon - 2 (See earlier post)
Mistle Thrush - 2 (See earlier post)
= 15