Waxham Ringing (YBW, redpolls and controls)

At last, some Easterly winds! This tied in with some free time and finally we got out to Waxham for the first and possibly only time this autumn. We spent three days (12th-14th October) at Waxham and these resulted in some great catches. The first on the 13th being pictured above, this was caught amazingly in our triangle of nets out in the field for catching Meadow Pipits! The second highlight was a haul of 120 lesser redpolls on the 14th, slightly disappointing however was also on the 14th - shortly after Will found a Siberian Chiffchaff hopping round on the ground we watched it go straight into one of out nets before soon after flying out... doh, at the same time an unringed ybw was meters from the net but not going in... also NO BLUETAIL for us! Infuriating!

Congrats to every other ringer on the coast which all seem to have had a bluetail! They're common birds anyway...

Controls (anyone recognise these?) LESRE Y395783 & L530291, MEAPI L694287

(retraps)
(*controls)

A bit of a catch up.

Due to a ringing expedition to Georgia for myself, Ross Crates (ex UEA) and Stephen Menzie (See here - birdingandphotography.blogspot.com) I haven't been keeping the blog updated, so here's a brief catch-up.

Broads Swallow Roost

A couple of us did a swallow roost in the broads back on September 3rd, It was quite successful and we caught a total of 101 birds 96 new swallows, 3 Sand Martins and 2 Controls (L844574 & Y228006).

Campus & Whitlingham demonstrations for students

Species	Whitlingham 26/9/11	UEA  27/9/11	Total	Notes
Wren	6(1)	1	8	Retrap from 2011
Blackcap	14(1)	3	18	Retrap 2011
Robin	2(2)	6(1)	11	Retraps from 2010 and 2011
Dunnock	3(2)	7	12
Blackbird	1	5	6
Great tit	18(3)	16(5)	42	2 retraps from 2009, 1 from 2010
Blue tit	19(7)	29(11)	66	1 control. 1 bird from cringleford
Treecreeper	1(1)	1	3	Retrap from 2011
Chaffinch	3(1)	6	10	Retrap from 2010
Goldcrest	1	1	2
Goldfinch	3	17(1)	21	Retrap from 2011
Long tailed tit	16(2)	4	22	Retraps from 2011
Chiffchaff	2	2	4
Greenfinch	1	41	42
Green woodpecker	1		1
Song thrush		1	1
	111	158	269

Campus Sessions

We also did a couple of campus sessions catching a further 100 or so birds, mostly tits and finches, including the first redpoll of the autumn.

CES 3 - Norfolk Broads (inc. 2 Controls - X050107 & L702451)

Our third CES visit of the year was much more successful than the last, with the help of the wind dropping right off this morning, the birds (and unfortunately midges) were much more mobile. Two controls, a Bearded Tit, 5 Groppers, a fly through osprey and numerous dragonflies and Swallowtail butterflies were the highlights. 


Total 36 new (21 retrap) 2 controls


Blackbird 1
Wren 1
Robin 2
Blackcap 2
Sedge Warbler 9 (14) + 1 cont. X050107
Grasshopper Warbler 4 (1)
Reed Warbler 4 (3)
Willow Warbler 4 (2)
Chiffchaff 1
Great Tit (1)
Bearded Tit 1
Long-tailed Tit 1
Jay 2
Reed Bunting 4 + 1cont L702451

A better Sand Martin catch (5 controls + REEBU control!!!)

On Saturday night Iain and a few of the ringing group arranged to meet up to have a larger and more prepared attempt at the Sand Martin roost down in the UEA reedbed. They put nets up in all 3 areas where we have seen them go to roost and were successful catching 42 new Sand Martins and 5 controls! They also caught 2 new Reed Buntings and 1 control! and 2 long-taild Tits. (Photos stolen from Karl's facebook, hope you dont mind Karl...)

Controls were as follows:

Sand Martin

L435188
X118157
X118199
X118261
V506471 (caught last week)

Reed Bunting

T385217

Surprise Sand Martin catch - including control V506471

Control Sand Martin V506471, UEA 13/04/2011

So, popped down the UEA marsh with Will this evening to move some net poles to the reedbed in preparation for some warbler catches and hopefully some roosting sand martins in the weeks to come. There were actually quite a few sedges warblers in and a few reed bunts kicking around so I ran back to the car and grabbed a couple of nets and the ringing gear. Just as we finished setting up, ringed a sedgie, then noticed a small flock of sand martins - great they're in. Stuck on the tape and over the next 20 mins the flock grew to 300 strong! We caught a measly 17 birds out of the 300 (I say measly but its the most we've caught on campus in the last 5 years I think). Also one was a control V506471.


Myself and Iain also ringed a nest of 4 Blackbird chicks this morning as well as finding a further 4 Blackbird nests, 1 robin nest (2 day old chicks) and 2 Song Thrush (1 eggs, 1 young chicks).

First Blabi Pulli & Lotti control DAC372

Iain spent his lunch yesterday looking for nests, he found several Lotti nests, a Greenfinch nest and a couple of Blackbird nests. Surprisingly one of these contained 3 well grown chicks, old enough to ring. He gave me a text (as I'm working towards an open nest pullus endorsement) and I went in to Uni to ring them.

Earlier in the morning we had attempted a session at a new farm site we've been feeding up for a couple of weeks. It turned out to be a bit of a failure catching just 7 resident birds, so we took down the feeders and will use the site next winter.

Farm Totals

Dunnock 1

Blue Tit 2 (M&F)

Great Tit 2 (M&F)

Chaffinch 2 (M&F)

Finally, some recent campus sessions 

17/3/11 Greenhouse:

Great Tit 1(3)

Siskin 4(2)

Robin 1(1)

Blackcap 1

Blue Tit 1(4)

Blackbird 1

Chaffinch 1(1)

1 RECOVERED Blue Tit - ringed UEA, 5M FROM 2010 - dead beneath a window at UEA.

25/3/11 Greenhouse: 

Wren 1

Great Tit 1(15)

Siskin 3

Robin (3)

Brambling 6

Blue tit  (5)

Dunnock 1(3)

Chaffinch 3

Song Thrush 1

Blackbird 1

Wood Pigeon 1

22/3/11 Sainsbury's Centre  

Long-tailed Tit (5) 1 CONTROL DAC372

Great Tit 7(7)

Chaffinch 3

Blue Tit 3(6)

Dunnock (1)

Reed Bunting 1

Great Spotted Woodpecker (1)

Robin 1

Last week catch-up and yet more Waxwi's

A morning session at the greenhouses feeding station on UEA produced another control this week, a Male chaffinch (V917944). Otherwise a fairly standard morning with 48 birds.

6M Chaffinch - control V917944

Totals (retraps)

Dunnock 1
Blackbird 5 (1)
Great Tit 3 (7)
Blue Tit 4 (13)
Chaffinch 2 + 1 control
Greenfinch 4 + 1 from Rob Robinson (2.5miles)
Goldfinch 3

With the generous permission of the John Innes Centre we were able to attempt to catch the waxwings in their carpark. 15 were present when we arrived but before we'd even got out of the car they'd b*ggered off (I think they recognise my car...). After an hour 7 came back but decided to change their flightpath so our net was in the wrong place. So we put up another net and caught 2. A lot of effort for two waxwings...

Anyway the good news is that those berries are now exhausted and they've made the short hop to UEA Campus (hoorah) where the group were successful in catching a further 11 birds yesterday (although i'm informed that about 30 bounced...)

Campus Ringing & Habitat Management

Yesterday morning at the "greenhouse" feeding station resulted in 47 birds, 33 new (13 retrap) + 1 control (anyone recognise L732088 ?). A few of us spent the evening at the Norfolk Ringers meeting, an evening well spent with details of ringing totals throughout Norfolk and some really interesting short talks.


Spent most of the day in glorious spring sunshine at our Whitlingham ringing site, pollarding trees and cutting back vegetation to reduce the height and create the dense lower story thicket. Couldn't have been better weather and some really good work done in just a day.


Totals from yesterday


Blue Tit 7 (7)
Blackbird 3
Robin 1 (1) Retrap 2009
Dunnock 2 (1)
Goldfinch 6 (1) + 1 control L732088. Retrap 2008
Greenfinch 6
Great Tit 5 (3) 1 retrap from Tony, 1 from 2009
Chaffinch 2
Brambling 1