Colour problems

 Many of you will be familiar with birds whose feathers are not exactly coloured as expected. I've posted pictures recently of leucistic birds where the whole bird is a yellow tinge. And albino birds where all the bird is white are reasonably well known about. These are major genetic mutations affection the whole bird.

However, there are lots of more complex, but restricted colour problems in birds, and we've had two of these in the last few days.

First this male Blackbird had on one feather on each wing pure white...

I've seen several similar anomalies like this so it's cause must be quite a regular one. However, I've never before seen a Greenfich with the following colour abnormality.....

Why this is so interesting is that at first sight we could be looking at another bird with patches of white in the plumage. But look carefully and you will see the forehead nearest the camera is much greener than the rest of the head. I have no idea what to call this or how it has happened. Answers on a postcard please........
 

Hard work but stunning pics!

 It's a very strange time at the moment. Reports from far and wide tell of very poor numbers at feeding stations-as we are finding. However, as I've said before, it's testament to the enthusiasm and hard work of our team that modest numbers are still building because of their efforts. 

Gareth got out for the first time in a while this morning and caught his first Cetti's Warbler of the year. They are pretty special birds, at the northern edge of their distribution--and increasing--even if they are not particularly special to look at...

Continuing the warbler theme, Gareth also caught his first Chiffchaff of the year. Again, a pretty sombre coloured species--but the excitement they engender is palpable--Spring migration is with us!!

Jenni and Paul have been putting in the hours too--here's just a few of the stunning images from their efforts...

Jen's doing well for Brambling as they gather ready to migrate north. This is a stunning image of a male, and shows very well the buff tips to the black head feathers before they have all worn off to expose the black breeding colour of the head.

Blackcaps ( this is a male) are arriving in big numbers at the moment. It's not often you get to see them this close--just look at the white dots along the lower 'eyelid'

One of the very common resident birds we catch quite a lot of is the Wren--but I don't think I've posted a picture of one, so.....

This time last year Paul was catching dozens of Linnet at our 'spinner' feeder, but this year they are few and far between for some reason. He has caught a few though,

Here's a super adult male with a clean grey head and plenty of red feathers on the breast. There's a cold spell in the forecast and we're hoping this may lead to an increase in the number of birds at our feeders, fingers crossed

 

Who's a pretty boy then?

 We are nearing the height of the breeding season in the UK, so male birds in particular need to be looking their best in order to successfully attract a mate ( note to self....). I've mentioned in previous posts about males of winter flocking finches and buntings how the male feathers are often tipped with muted colours to reduce the aggression between males when all their energies need to be used in finding food.

So it is that by now most of those muted tips have worn away to expose the breeding colours at the base of the feathers. Here are some recent examples....

You can see that there is no remaining buff tips to any of the head feathers and this bird is now fully ready for breeding. In contrast however, let's look at this male Brambling, which will not be breeding for a couple of months yet because its arctic breeding grounds are still very cold

Here you can see most of the buff tips have not yet worn off except on the very front of the face. By the time the bird reaches Scandinavia it's head will be jet black and ready for action.

This resident male Reed Bunting is also just about there with only a few buff tips not yet worn off, but this adult male Redpoll is ready to breed....

A tale of tails

I've mentioned several times in these posts how important tail feathers are to ringers in ageing birds. This is particularly important in finches at this time of year; and here are a couple of pictures which I hope illustrate the point.

Juvenile tail feathers have been 'on' the birds since they left the nest in Summer 2021. As a result they are usually more worn and tatty ( technical word...) that those of adults which grew new tail feathers in their late summer annual moult. In addition juvenile tail feathers are usually pointed and less robust than adult feathers.

Here are two tails of Linnets we caught yesterday.....

The tail on the left is an adult and you can clearly see they are more rounded than those of the juvenile on the right

Here is the tail of a juvenile Goldfinch--two things to note here. First most of the tail feathers have become worn into points. Secondly, you can see the central two feathers are different. In many finches and buntings, the central tail feathers are sometimes moulted and adult feathers grow in their place. In this case you can see these feathers are less worn and pointed at the tip than the rest of the juvenile tail feathers--but also how much darker and less transparent they are--ie more robust.

 

Winter meets Summer

 Activity and most of our feeding stations is strangely inconsistent and unpredictable. This time last year we were catching big numbers of Siskin, Linnet and Yellowhammer but this year at the same sites numbers are well down. It's both worrying and puzzling.

However, persistence pays off ( mostly!!), and so it was that Jenni had a very interesting time at one of our Patshull feeders a couple of days ago. In amongst all the tits and finches such as this super winter visitor-a male Brambling, was the first of our Summer visitors.......a Chiffchaff. The Brambling will shortly be leaving us to go north to breed in Scandinavia, and the Chiffchaff will probably be staying with us to breed in the UK.

 

 

Some points of interest

 Team members have been out over the last few days, and although the catches have been modest, within them there have been some interesting points-I hope you agree.....

First, it's great that Greenfinches seem to be getting back to something like their previous numbers after a dreadful lung disease wiped out so many. This birds is a cracking adult male:-

The overall brightness and the amounts of yellow on the tail and wing tells you this is a male ( along with other features)--and the broad round tips to the tail feathers suggests this is an adult. A close inspection of the wing shows that it has three other features also confirming it as an adult:-

The greater covert feathers (1) are all the same age and colour with no suggestion of some of the outer ones being fawn; the primary coverts (2)all have a green outer edge and tipped in grey paint; and finally the large alula feather (3) is very yellow. Keep a look out for these features if you have any on your garden feeders.

I hope we will be seeing a lot more of Siskins over the coming weeks, here's the head of a smart male:-

But here's a shot of the bill of this bird from an unusual angle.......

You can clearly see the shape of the bill starts quite broad as it leaves the skull but then rapidly narrows from either side to form a sharp point. One of the favourite natural foods of Siskin is the seeds of the Alder tree, which are held in small cones. This shape of bill is ideal to be able to get into the cone and winkle out the seeds--brilliant!.

Another bird I hope we will see more of is the Brambling, a cousin of our Chaffinch which nests at much higher latitudes on the continent. Males like this one are coming into breeding condition now, so that when they arrive back on their breeding grounds they can get on with things quickly. You can see that the head feathers are showing through black as the pale tips wear off. The pale tips hid the black to reduce the aggression between males during winter when they feed in flocks-brilliant again.

Any time we catch a bird of prey such as this Sparrowhawk, is an exciting event. This is a young male. The small size of the bird is the clue to it's sex, and the yellow eye ( orange in adults) and the heart shaped markings on the breast ( horizontal bars in adults)-both point to a bird hatched last calendar year:-

More excitement to come soon--I hope!!

 

A decent start to March

 Looking back at last year, we find that March was a very good month when our feeding stations started to attract more finches than during the previous months of winter--undoubtedly because their natural food sources were becoming depleted. Will this happen again this year? Well the signs are positive. A message from Pat at Siskin City in mid Wales showed a video of a very active bird table with lots of Siskin, Greenfinch, Chaffinch and the prize species--Brambling. So we are all hoping that Pat will enjoy number to match his catch of over 600 Siskin last year--more of this in future blogs.

The first 5 days of March have been quite productive on several fronts. Interest in and activity by our team members remains high; more farmers are asking us about surveying their land; and we are still getting requests for  help and advice about thermal imaging and Jack Snipe from as far away as Lancashire and Israel. We are also hopeful of resurrecting our ringing scheme in the very north of arctic Norway--fingers very much crossed on that one.

Ringing around here has taken a notch up also. Teams have been out most days and so far we've ringed a decent number of birds -150-given that the weather is still not brilliant. In short:-

Only small numbers of Jack Snipe are at my prime site-worrying-, but a couple of nights ago we managed to catch two birds at our BPF site in a wet field. There were more than a dozen Common Snipe in the same field but as soon as one flies off calling that tends to spook the rest so we rarely manage to catch any of this species. We manged to ring a Grey Partridge and 6 Skylarks--but this is probably going to be our last thermal imaging session of the winter as birds are beginning to pair up now so we leave them to get on with breeding.

I'm a sucker for these gorgeous Jack Snipe-so here's another picture of one.

Paul reports a gradual increase in the number of birds- especially Yellowhammer, feeding at our spinner feeder. In the last couple of days he's caught 11 Yellowhammer, of which 6 were birds he had ringed previously. This pleases especially Tim the farmer to know that the birds are staying around--and we hope will breed.

A stonking male Yellowhammer!

Meanwhile Jenni visited a new friend's garden after a discussion with with said friend suggested she may have as many as FIVE Blackcaps wintering in her garden. Slightly sceptical, Jen put a net up a couple of days ago in the garden. As well as 11 Greenfinch, and 3 Goldfinch, Hey Presto!! she caught 3 Blackcaps and saw another 2 unringed in the garden. 

Here's one of the birds--clearly a male. I think she will be trying for the other two next week.......

Jen and Sam had a mega-bash at various sites around Patshull on Friday culminating with a thermal session in the evening--they had a modest catch but the main thing was they had a great time--that's what a hobby should be.

Yesterday we had two teams out. Paul ran onother great session at his BPF feeder for Tom who is making great progress towards his licence as a result of such opportunities.

Another team of six turned out for another super ringing demonstration for our good friends Keri and Annette who do so much for the community in running the Jubilee Wood project. There was a great turnout of people, and fortunately we managed to ring 44 new birds of a splendid range of species to keep everyone happy and interested. A couple of male Siskins wee the stars of the show--but they also served to show how male Siskins can be aged.

This first bird shows that all the greater covert feathers ( above the white mark) are edged green-showing this to be an adult bird....

By contrast this second bird is a juvenile as shown by the outer few greater coverts--again above the white line--are thinly edged white....

With a decent view it is possible to see this on birds feeding in your garden--giving you a chance to impress your friends and family with you knowledge!!!