Holme Pierrepont, Saturday 18 April

Nick, Gary and I, along with guest Lucy Jones held the first ringing session at the Grange end of Holme Pierrepont on Saturday morning. There was hardly a cloud in the sky and a good breeze was blowing from first thing. Sheltered spots at the site also had a ground frost on them so we quickly erected eight nets, missing out the exposed reedbed nets.

Catching was steady most of the morning and I was pleasantly surprised with a total catch of 44 birds, 29 of them being warblers. A Green Woodpecker towards the end of the session in one of the nets was nice as it had been around all morning.

The catch was made up of (new/retrap): Green Woodpecker 1/0, Blackbird 0/1, Song Thrush 1/0, Dunnock 2/0, Wren 0/2, Robin 0/1, Reed Warbler 0/1, Sedge Warbler 4/0, Blackcap 14/2, Chiffchaff 2/1, Willow Warbler 4/1, Long-tailed Tit 2/0, Treecreeper 1/1, Reed Bunting 2/1.

There were plenty of Blackcaps around but I did not see or hear any Reed Warblers; until we caught one! Along with one of the Blackcaps they were the oldest retraps of the morning, both being returning birds from 2010 - but curiously neither had been caught in the intervening years. A good start, more to follow next weekend if the weather allows!

Kev

 Green Woodpecker (Nick Humphreys)