New 'Thermal' season up and running

Last night we ventured forth for our first evening visit to a local farm to see what we could find in the field using our thermal imaging camera provided by the WMBC.
The first three field we looked at produced nothing avian--a few mice, rabbits and a badger were the only animals we saw.
However, in the next field--stubble, there were between 20 and 30 skylark of which we managed to ring 6 --the first of the season.
This was our first session at a new farm where the farmer is interested in monitoring how his developing no till practice is affecting wild life. We propose to visit systematically through the winter to provide him with as much data as possible
For generally ' little brown birds'--Skylarks are rather handsome in a subtle, understated way--as you can see from this picture:-

Over recent years we have noticed a great variation in the length of the hind claw. Birds which live on the ground for long periods tend to have long hind claws--but we're not quite sure if there is anything other than normal variation behind the large variation in hind claw length. The picture tries to show this from two birds last night. You need to look carefully at the bottom picture to see just how long the claw is; it's not far short of twice the length of that in the top pic:-

 

Where are they coming from?

That's the question we're asking ourselves about these Blackcaps. It was a pretty wet and windy day yesterday--and it continued through the night so not a particularly good night for migration. However, it eased off just after dawn so we were able to open nets in conditions that weren't as bad as we had expected.
We ended up with almost 60 birds of which guess which species formed almost half of the catch. Pretty easy question--Blackcaps. Which prompted the title question -- where are they coming from--because all other ringing stations are also reporting big numbers of this species. It seems like there are only really two possibilities and probably both are operating. First it looks like they had a great breeding season-and judging by the look of some recent young birds there could have been lots of second broods hatched successfully. It's also possible of course that there has been a strong passage of continental birds passing through Britain. We  might get some idea of this if there are any recoveries of birds ringed elsewhere earlier this year.

The only two other things of note were 2 Sedge warblers-one new one a re-trap; because this is getting quite late for them not to have set off for Africa.
Second, we caught 10 new Long Tailed Tits today suggesting that a flock from somewhere else ( probably quite near) has moved into the site, because we are pretty sure that apart from the odd one or two we have ringed all of the Long Tails on site over the Summer.
Generally the team are feeling that we might as well continue so long as there are birds migrating through the site--can't argue with that.......

Record breaker!!

Morning starts are now 06.30 as autumn comes on--and a happy band of old timers plus Emma, turned out this morning feeling none too hopeful after yesterdays downpour and further overnight rain. There was still dampness in the air as we opened, and an initial scan of the nets as we did so revealed............nothing!
However, things began to improve and by 09.00 we had amassed a creditable catch of 64 new birds!Of these a remarkable 42 were Blackcaps! 8 Chiffchaffs, 1 Goldcrest and 2 quite late Reed Warblers were the only other true migrants.
The Blackcap shown below was a pretty significant bird:-

We christened this bird 'Blackcap 700'-- because it was just that--our seven hundredth Blackcap since the season started on July 2nd--remarkable!! Just to put this in context, in the last two years we had what were record years for Blackcap--with around 350 each year. Up to then our best year since starting in 2007 was 185. Looking at the reports from other ringing stations in the country with similar stories, it seems that Blackcaps have had a brilliant breeding season--helped possibly by a big influx from the continent. We hope we come across some British ringed birds in a couple of weeks time on our annual ringing trip to the Algarve in Portugal. This is a major wintering place for Blackcaps as they feed on the many berry bearing plants available through the winter.

The next Blackcap picture is useful for illustrative purposes. All nestling Blackcaps have brown caps no matter if they are male or female. Then during the first couple of months after fledging, males grown in black cap feathers and females grow in brown ones. Sometimes its very easy to age males as birds of the year as some of the brown juvenile feathers haven't been completely moulted out--as shown beautifully by this juvenile male Blackcap:-

Will the Blackcaps still be coming through on Saturday??

 

While the cat's away........

It ALWAYS happens--as soon as I take a holiday away from the reserve, something good turns up!! In fact I'm delighted--especially for the guys in the team who put the hours in; the more so to cover when I'm away. This time TWO special birds turned up-along with continuing big numbers of common migrants.
On Saturday 14th September, the team was met by pretty low temperatures after a clear night. A good catch of 82 new birds included yet another 51 Blackcaps plus a sprinkling of other migrant warblers. However, the star bird was this year's first Grasshopper warbler. We don't even manage one of this species each year, so every time we do ring one, it's a very special day. The photo isn't the best but it shows the salient features.

You can see the short round wings and relatively long rounded tail, a few speckles on the breast and a mottled back. This species comes in a variety of base colour phases--this is the commonest with an olive brown hue. Others have are greeny, some yellowy and others greyish. One of the reasons few are caught is that they are not that common--but another is that they are incredibly skulking and tend to run around on the ground rather than fly. Therefore they often evade capture unless either the nets are set very low, or they decide to fly up for some reason.

The following Monday, an extra session resulted in a more modest catch of only 29 birds--but if ever the phrase quality over quantity applied then it was today. Over the last 15 years of ringing at Belvide we have only previously caught one Cetti's warbler--today brought our second.

This species may not be a stunner in the looks department--plain brown above, grey beneath, with short wings an a longish round tail-but it is part of an interesting story. It's essentially a Mediterranean species which has been steadily colonising northern Europe during the last 50 years or so. There are healthy breeding populations not too far away from Belvide but apart from occasional wintering individuals they haven't yet bred here. We think the habitat looks just right but clearly THEY don't--but we keep everything crossed that they will become a breeding species at the reserve.

The team turned out on Wednesday catching another very respectable 73 new birds, including 27 Blackcap and 23 Chiffchaff, until the rings ran out !! Pretty sure that won't happen again.

Lastly, I missed yesterday's session as I helped with a ringing demonstration at Ladywalk--but the stalwart team ploughed on with another really good session at Belvide with another 67 new birds, including 28 Blackcap ( over 600 of these since 2nd July!!)--and this beauty.....

It's great to be back--let's see what the last few sessions of the season bring....

 

 

 

Another milestone reached

After a night of strong winds with some rain, I guess it was no surprise that we caught fewer birds this morning. However, when last evening's catch was added to this morning's we still had a very respectable 105 new birds. This meant that we have passed 2000 new birds since 2nd July--a new record.
The main species were Blackcap 28, Chiffchaff 20, Willow warbler 5, Sedge warbler 4, Reed warbler 2, and with a hint of the on-coming late Autumn, 7 Goldcrests. Special bird of the day was a Spotted Flycatcher-- see below

Like most Spotted Flycatchers ringed at this time of year, this is a juvenile bird as can be seen by the broad buff tips to many of the wing feathers and you can just see similar edges on the upper tail coverts where the tail meets the body.

We often catch 1 or 2 Nuthatches at Belvide, and then mainly at the bird feeding station during the winter months. So far this year at our main ringing site, we have caught 4 Nuthatches --with 3 caught today/yesterday.

The following shots are NOT good pictures of Nuthatches ( see my recent post for a better picture) but these two pictures show you how to tell males from females and this can sometimes be seen in the field--if you are lucky!!

This tries to show the undertail coverts--these form a V shape--the bird on the left is a male and shows these feathers having broad white tips with chestnut bases whereas the female on the fight has white tips but buff coloured bases to these feathers.

Again the male is on the left and shows dark chestnut thighs while the female on the right has no chestnut in this area

 

 

 

Another Record breaker!!

I mentioned yesterday that I had little hope of doing well but ( not for the first time) I was proved wrong. I was hopeful about this morning because the forecast was almost perfect. Because it was the second morning in a row I suggested we meet a bit later at 7 am but Pete and Kev were at the site for 6 am for a usual start time. And were we glad they were!!
There had clearly been a big fall of migrants--mainly Blackcaps again, and we ended the morning with a record breaking 163 new birds of which was a record breaking 124 Blackcaps insane!!
The supporting warbler cast was made up of 9 Sedge, 5 Reed, 5 Chiffchaff and singles of Willow, Garden, Whitethroat and Lesser Whitethroat.
A few Meadow Pipits were moving though and we caught three--one for each trainee there--which proved very educational as below:-

The vast majority of Meadow Pipits we catch are juveniles and can be aged by having two generations of feathers ( juvenile mainly with some moulted in adult feathers)--as can be seen in this bird. Most of the non flight wing feathers are white or cream tipped including the three terials ( the feathers lying on top of each other at the innermost part of the wing next to the body)

In contrast this adult bird has broad buff edges to these same feathers, they are all similarly edged, and the centres of those feathers are blacker than those of the juvenile bird.

It's not often that out of such a small catch of this species, we were able to get our eyes in on what to look for in juvenile/adult plumages.

Lastly, I make no excuse for posting a couple more pictures of the Lesser Whitethroat we caught today--they are just so SMART.

 

 

 

Another TON of birds!!

I must admit to being not very hopeful about this morning's visit because the wind was forecast to be NNW which is bad for our nets. However, as things turned out the wind speed was very low so it had little impact on the nest. As a result we had another great catch of 106 new birds of which 66 were Blackcaps--they are still piling though in big numbers !!
In addition we had 21 Chiffchaffs while other warbler numbers are dropping off fast as expected--Sedge warbler 5, Reed warbler 6, and Willow warbler 1.
Trainees had some great learning points from the first Meadow pipit of the season, a Marsh tit and a couple of Reed buntings--all of which are shown below.
First the Marsh tit:-

This bird shows classic Marsh tit characters:-small shiny cap, small discreet bib, smudgy cheeks, light spot at the base of the upper mandible, and no obvious light edges to the secondaries so no panel formed on the wing.

Ageing pipits can be quite tricky since the juveniles seem to moult their coverts and tertials in almost random ways unlike most species which have distinct patterns of moult. On this bird you can see the upper tertial ( the most inner group of feathers) has white edges rather than buff--and the inner most greater covert is broadly edged buff rather than all of the others which are edged cream. This is clearly a juvenile bird--and the first of many we hope.

One of the ways of identifying meadow pipit in the hand is by both the length and shape of the hind claw. As you can see here, the hind claw is very long and relatively straight. In tree pipit for example, this claw is much shorter and very curved.

This is an adult male Reed Bunting--but it has a brown head I can hear you saying.

In this next picture you can see a close up of the top of the head:-

If you look carefully you can see that the head feathers have brown tips but the lower part of the feathers is black. The newly moulted feathers provide an apparent brown head which means that these birds can feed in large flocks in winter without aggression because they all look like females. The brown tips however, gradually wear off during the winter to expose the black body of the feathers by next spring--just in time for the birds to begin breeding, attract mates and become aggressive towards other males--pretty clever!!

Reed Buntings can be tricky to age--but these two are relatively easy. The one on the left is the male above, and all the feathers are clearly broad and well rounded at the tips--an adult feature. The bird on the right is a juvenile ( born this year) and you can clearly see the pointed, typically juvenile shaped tail feathers.

A Wryneck has been sighted on the reserve this morning--now wouldn't that be a brilliant bird to ring.? We had already decided to have an extra session tomorrow morning-before the Wryneck was sighted so.......fingers crossed for the morning.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Martin Morning

Last evening, Pete and I decided to offer an extra session for a couple of trainees who couldn't make this morning. We caught 21 new birds which gave us plenty of opportunity to spend more time than usual looking at some detail at the birds we caught and introducing extra techniques. This also set us off to a good start for our session this morning.
In near perfect weather things got off again to a good start and kept going until around 9 am when we finished. The combined total was 118 new birds with another 38 Blackcaps,24 Chiffchaffs, 6 Sedge warbler, 4 Reed warbler, 2 Garden warbler and 1 Lesser Whitethroat. It's noticeable--but expected, that the reed and 'sedgies' are dropping off as they have almost all set off on their long migration south. Even after all these years we've been ringing, Pete and I still marvel at the incredible feats of endurance and navigation these tiny sprites undergo--brilliant!
As the mornings at this time of year tend to be a bit cooler, it gives u the opportunity of ringing 'hirundines'. This is the collective group comprising Swallow, House and Sand Martins in the UK. The cool air keeps their flying insect food low which in turn means the hirundines need to fly low in order to feed--thus bringing them within catching range. This morning saw a squadron of Sand Martins whizzing round the nets and resulted in us ringing 22 of these little beauties. Over the years we have ringed thousands of sand martins-which are easy to age because juveniles have pale edges to many of the upper body feathers as you can see in the three pictures below--all of which are juvenile birds. But look a bit closer and you will see subtle differences in the colour of these edgings:-

This bird had pale buff edges

These edges are predominantly white

And these are mixed white and buff.

We suppose that somewhere there is an explanation in the text books but we've never seen one. I have a hunch that the edges start off white and that in some cases perhaps the colour of the sand (in which this species digs nest burrows) may stain the edges buff? Doesn't really explain the mixed bag though..........!!??

Since we had our session today--THERE IS NO SESSION ON WEDNESDAY 4th

Next session is planned for Saturday 7th.