Church Farm coming to the fore

 Redwing numbers have remained low again this week, along with most other birds. Here are a couple of pictures from this morning which show how to age Redwings--and which are sometimes visible in the field.....

This bird has a white patch at the end of a tertial feather ( blue arrow) which is a juvenile feature. Often there are more feathers with these tips on. The shape of the tail feathers is also key as can be seen (just!!) in this awful picture!!

It is a rubbish picture but you can make out how each feather is pointed--making it juvenile--adult tail feathers are broad and round.

Aside from Redwings, team members have been pushing on with other species too, and we reached an important milestone today when we passed 6,000 birds ringed this year. This is quite a few less than recent years but it's been a difficult year with several obstacles getting in the way of us ringing as many birds as normal.

However, we continue to develop our relationships with our farm managers. I've posted several times about Tim at Brewood Park Farm, but we have also been working closely with Michael at Church Farm. Michael is working closely with Tim on developing a no till approach and his farm is becoming another rich source of birds. And just like Tim, he really appreciates the results we provide to him.

When conditions allow, we try to do a couple of ringing sessions at a feeding station a week, and a thermal imaging session once a week. This week saw us ring the first Woodcock of the season, as well as providing Michael with totals of the species we saw in his fields, and at the feeding station.

Being set in a small hamlet, and with what looks like a healthy population of House Sparrows--we are hoping to set up a project to study the movements of House Sparrows in the village. We are about to see how many of the village community want to take part in the project--which will involve us putting coloured plastic rings on the sparrows' legs in combinations which will make them individually identifiable without us needing to catch them. We are putting on a demonstration of bird ringing for the village on Saturday 2nd December where we will also be able to explain the project in a bit more detail----looking forward to it!!   More details about this as things develop.