Mixed Bag

 Group members and friends are continuing to exploit as many opportunities as possible as we prepare for our annual 'main event' at Belvide reservoir. Here are a few snippets from our activities.......

First our friend Roger has a special licence which enables him to check and ring Barn Owl chicks in the many nestboxes that we and others put up in the area.

One of our boxes on BPF had birds in them but when we first checked a couple of weeks ago they were too small. This time they were large enough to ring but still too downy to see the pattern of breast feathers which would have enabled them to be sexed...

Yesterday at another farm, there were three chicks and as you can see they were quite a bit older and had lost almost all their down....

 Staying with BPF, the feeders have become much busier as newly fledged birds--especially Great Tits have found an easy supply of food. This Blue tit seems to be developing well even though it has a deformed 'crossed' bill...

It's quite remarkable how many such deformities we see, with apparently healthy outcomes. I suggest the easy food such as fat balls may have some part to play in their success....

Lots of baby birds means lots of potential food for Sparrowhawks.....This is a bird we originally ringed as a youngster in spring 2021, which we retrapped a couple of days ago.

It's showing the orange eyes which this species develops as it gets older, as opposed to the bright yellow eyes in juveniles. The next picture shows a couple of the needle-sharp talons of this species--lethal weapons when they puncture skin, blood vessels and organs--it's these not the beak, which despatches most prey items.

An adult male Great Spotted Woodpecker was an unexpected catch as we thought we had ringed all the adults coming to the feeder. This picture shows the red patch at the back of the head which males have--plain black in females.

Meanwhile out in mid Wales, Pat is have a bit more variety in his garden catches. here is a female Blackbird showing the brown blotches on a grey breast of the female--very different from the black blotches on a white breast in the Song Thrush.

Finally, this morning dawned damp and cool so I popped down to Belvide to see if there were any Swifts flying low enough to catch. Bingo! I caught 17 before torrential rain stopped play. Here's a Swift showing the plain brown plumage ( which looks black as they hurtle through the air)

 

Spot the baby.....and the rarity!!

 It's been an interesting week with a highlight that didn't involve ringing!!

Team members have been plugging away in gardens and feeding stations making the best of the available birds. Attendance at feeders is increasing, mainly because young, newly fledged birds are finding feeding stations a good source of 'easy' food. So I thought I would show a few of these very young birds, which you will see in your gardens, and illustrate those features which identify these birds as newly fledged,

You can tell that this is a Goldfinch because of the bright yellow patch on the wing--but there is no characteristic red, black and white pattern on the head. Instead the head and breast are mottled brown and cream. Without the red/black, these birds don't pose a threat to the adults ( and their parents) so they continue to be fed and protected. In a few weeks, the colours will grow through and the youngsters will gradually be shunned and sent off to look after themselves.

It's almost exactly the same for this baby Greenfinch. The mottled breast and lack of intense green colours are typical and serve the same purpose as in the Goldfinch.

This is a bird misidentified so many times!. It's a newly fledged Robin. The lack of a red breast avoids aggression as above. As the red feathers grow in these youngsters will get more able to fend for themselves.

Yesterday I visited Belvide reservoir to see if there were any Swifts low enough to be caught. Sadly there were none, but as I scanned the water I picked out what I was sure was quite a rare bird. Unfortunately I didn't have my telescope to clinch it and my binoculars weren't powerful enough. I phoned out for others to come with their optics but just before they arrived the flew off!! I felt terrible and none of the birders could find the bird despite an hour or so of searching.

Just as I was about to give up and go home, I spotted the bird in a different part of the reservoir and managed to get close enough to see it and identify it as a Red Necked Phalarope. A small wader which actuallt feeds by floating on water and picking insects off the surface. This one was an adult female....

They are absolutely gorgeous birds and a small number of pairs breed on the Shetland Isles. A good number of the local birders managed to come and see it too.

Home and Away

 I've mentioned previously that at this time of year it can be difficult catching large numbers of birds by conventional means because many are breeding and distributed more thinly on their territories. Out in mid-Wales Pat still has plenty of birds coming to his feeders from the many breeding pairs of Siskin in the surrounding area. For the rest of us it can be a lot of work for not much reward.

However, team members have been enthusiastically setting nets in their gardens, and catching birds such as this recently fledged House Sparrow in Kev's garden...

You can see the loose, fluffy plumage that young birds have--but you can also see the bright yellow flanges of the base of the beaks--the gape--again an indicator of juveniles.

Paul's also been regularly catching at the farm feeding station--and quite a few Stock Doves have been visiting. I though I would show a picture of the colourful patch on the side of the neck of this under studied species..

Feather colours are of two types. The first is where the feather has pigments embedded in the feather--but these feathers don't rely of pigments-they rely on the reflection and absorption of light. \as such, the colour can change--in this case they look green, but if the bird turns even a fraction they can look, blue or purple. That's the 'home' part of the title--so now let's look at 'away'.

Although we have lots of nestboxes at our sites, they are generally attracting Blue and Great Tits. Last year we inherited a nest box scheme in Herefordshire (ie away), which attracts exotic ( for us), species such as Pied Flycatcher and Redstart. Last weekend we had a delightful day ringing lots of 'Pied Fly' chicks with Gareth and his two beautiful daughters of 7 and 5 years old. Here's a picture of a brood of 7 healthy Pied Fly chicks

There was great excitement at one of the boxes when a female Redstart was seen leaving a box containing eggs. If they hatch and grow I hope to show some pics in a couple of weeks.

Our good friend Roger has a very large nestbox scheme also in Herefordshire and he generously allows members of our team to join him which gives them good experience. Jenni joined him at the weekend and they ringed over 100 Pied Fly chicks. His site also has breeding Wood Warbler and they managed to ring an adult bird. These are marginally bigger than a Willow Warbler--but they are much more striking in the amount of bright green plumage, with a striking yellow stripe over the eye ( supercilium ), and a bright yellow throat.

I hope to have more for you soon, as we build up to the start of the post-breeding/migration season at our sites.