Sunday 27 November 2016

Sunday ringing

Hello

John Woollett and team enjoyed a successful ringing experience at Stortons Gravel Pits today with 65 captures made up of 38 new birds and 27 re-traps. Highlights included two new Cetti's Warblers, a Chiffchaff, 7 Goldcrests, 4 Blackbirds and 8 Redwings.

A second day of ringing at Harrington Airfield succeeded in 86 captures dominated by migrant thrushes. Flock after flock of Redwings streamed in from the south-east, most flocks also including plenty of Fieldfares. Several hundreds of birds were involved as we watched some of them funnel down into the berry bushes on the old airfield with others lingering briefly and then passing over.

As a result we managed to catch and ring 66 new Redwings and 7 Fieldfares. None of the birds caught yesterday were caught again today, further proof of the nomadic behaviour of these birds during the autumn and winter. The vast majority of the Redwings handled and assessed during the last two days have been young birds hatched this year.

Other birds noted at Harrington Airfield amounted to about seventy Golden Plovers, a Barn Owl and a fly-over Siskin.

We managed to find time to watch over the gull roost at Pitsford Reservoir this afternoon and picked out two Caspian Gulls (adult and a third year) amongst the 8,000 or so gulls roosting there plus the usual Grey Wagtail.

Regards

Neil M

Caspian Gull at Pitsford
Reservoir (image taken in
March 2016)

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