Siskin bonanza

Hello

Kenny Cramer and team returned to Linford Lakes on Saturday to complete some more ringing and in the hope of connecting with some more migrant finches. 

With a rather large team Kenny felt a little under pressure to ensure there were sufficient birds to ring and in addition to mist nets he deployed some traps too. He needn't have worried as there were plenty of birds to go around with one hundred and twenty-six captures of fifteen species, ninety-six of which were newly-ringed. And those gorgeous little yellow finches the Siskins dominated proceedings with seventy-five being caught and processed, sixty-eight of which were new, six of which were re-traps from the previous week-end and a bird bearing a ring from elsewhere.

This spring has seen a major movement of these stunning and charismatic finches with speculation that the inflated numbers may be continental birds. However we now have details of the bird found with a ring on already - it was a female first ringed in The Highlands in Scotland on 23rd May 2023 - and this ringing date and location suggests it is a breeding bird from Scotland rather than from elsewhere. So it seems that at least some of these yellow perils are Scottish birds simply moving up the country and raiding garden bird feeders along the way!

Kenny reported that there were plenty of other Siskins there that they didn't catch but other finches processed included a Lesser Redpoll, six Goldfinches, three Chaffinches and four Greenfinches.

Two Black-headed Gulls were caught in traps, adults not regularly caught and ringed locally. Other birds encountered included four Chiffchaffs, a Goldcrest, a Great Spotted Woodpecker, a Song Thrush and a Reed Bunting.

Other birds noted on-site included a Great White Egret, a Water Rail, Common Snipe and Oystercatcher.

Regards

Neil M

Map depicting the rough
location of the ringed Siskin
in May last year and the location
(Linford Lakes) where it was
subsequently encountered on
Saturday.

Courtesy of Nick Wood.

Siskins on the feeders
at Linford Lakes - Kenny
spoils them with sunflower
 hearts!

Black-headed Gull.

Images courtesy of
Kenny Cramer.