Brackenhurst, Sunday 17 March

We didn't celebrate St Patrick's day at Brack yesterday, but it was wet enough for us to be in the west of Ireland with water oozing out of very pore in the ground. We had a good turnout from the Group including Ruth, Gary, David, Pete S and Emma for the second student ringing demonstration of the winter at the feeders (in my day they occupied buildings, now they just watch).

The weather, to begin with, was better than we feared and was nice enough til the rain kicked in from about 11:00 am. The birds were steady and averaged c10 per round which was about right in demo terms in that there was time to show the birds to the students & explain about their moult and ageing. In all we processed 58 birds, about a third of which were our target sp Yellowhammer. It looks like the Long-tailed Tits are at it as we caught three 'pairs'. We often recapture older birds as spring approaches as birds return to their breeding territories, and retraps included Robin, Blue and Great Tit from 2010, Chaffinch 2008 and 2010 and a 2009 Yellowhammer.

Totals were 38/20 (new/retraps): Dunnock 1/1, Robin 2/2, Blackbird 3/-, Long-tailed Tit 5/1, Blue Tit 2/2, Great Tit 3/6, Tree Sparrow 1/-, Chaffinch 7/4, Yellowhammer 15/3, Reed Bunting -/1.

Other observations included a pair of Peregrines on the powerlines and a flock of about 20 Siskins.

Jim

All pics by David Hodkinson.