Very early Tawny Owl

Whilst doing winter maintenance work at Brackenhurst, Simon Taylor found a Tawny Owl sitting on four eggs at Brackenhurst on the 10th January. Its very unusual to find them breeding this early, and this far north, and often we'd still be clearing squirrel dreys out of the boxes in order to allow the TOs to breed at the more usual time of March onwards.

Anyway, went to have a look see on Monday with low expectations after the recent cold weather, which got even lower when told on site that 'pigeons' had been going in and out of the box. However, this was all knocked in to a cocked hat when I found a single FS chick in the box. Going by how clean the box was, I'd say the other eggs and or siblings had been recycled.

I checked with the BTO's Dave Leech to see how early our bird was in national terms. Dave advised, that ringing wise, on the Nest Records Scheme database, that this is the joint earliest ever recorded - two more records on 5th March in 1974 and 2003, on the 6th and two on the 10th, then the rest are from 26th March onwards (4,829 in total). However, there may be a few older ones on the Ringing DataBase, and I'm looking in to that with the BTO.

Jim

Recent recoveries

A mixed bag of recoveries this week. An Aslockton Barn Owl, ringed in July 2011 became a road casualty 12km away this January, and a Hucknall Blackbird ringed in November 2011 was taken by a cat in Leicestershire, also in January. A Goldfinch ringed in Clifton Wood in March 2008 was captured at Gibraltar Point in March 2011, and we now know that a Reed Warbler which we controlled at Holme Pierrepont in July 2011 was initially ringed in Hondarribia, Spain as a juvenile in August 2007.

Ian

New traps

Tried some of the new traps Jim ordered last week and it looks as if they work well.

Gary

Latest Shiants Recoveries

As so many of the Group have been to the Shiants in recent years, I thought you'd be interested in the latest recoveries from the Shiants Auk RG.

We had our first recovery from the hundred plus Shags we've coloured ringed in the last two years. Trouble was it were dead! However, maybe the bright red CR caught the eye of the chap walking his dog on the mainland beach 44 km away. Two Razor pulli were also washed up in Denmark & Holland, having travelled 1131 km and 881 km respectively. Scant reward for having fledged flightless and then swam with their Dad over the top of Scotland and then . . . . According to the Migration Atlas Shiants chicks tend to be found further south in their 1st winter. So a recovery almost into the Baltic, in the case of the Danish Razor, is uncommon. Finally, a 2009 ringed Storm Petrel was controlled on North Rona 141 km to the north (next stop Iceland etc) last July by the Sule Skerry RG. I was on there meself in 2009 when we controlled a Shiants bird that SARG had ringed two weeks previously (too tired to notice at the time).

Jim

Daneshill Landfill Site with NNRG, Monday 27 February

Due to the success of last week's gull cannon-netting session at Daneshill, it was decided to give it another go yesterday. Twelve of last weeks 14 returned, together with another eight folks! All the hi-viz apparel hurt the eyes. With the site sussed now we had had the cannons set by 9ish, and fired for the first catch around 11 and took about 150 small and 30 large gulls. These were processed by early afternoon and we got set to fire again, this time taking c150 gulls with big gulls forming a better percentage of the catch. Two of the Black-headed Gulls were Danish colour-ringed birds from the same project (which we've contacted for original ringing details). Most of the big gulls were immatures, so there was plenty of musing over ID & ageing with these complex taxa. There's also a write-up of the session here: http://www.davehallam.blogspot.com/2012/02/gulls-arent-vermin.html

Again most of the Black-headed Gulls had RED darvics fitted, all the Common Gulls ORANGE and the Great Black-backed Gulls YELLOW ones. Total catch for the day was: Black-headed Gull 280 new & 2 controls, Common Gull 6 new, Herring Gull 17, Greater Black-backed Gull 30.

Jim

Rushcliffe Country Park, Sunday 28 February

Gary, Steve, Nick and I made another visit to RCP yesterday - but the catch keeps going down!. We finished on only 22 birds, 11 of which were retraps. However, one was a control, and I believe the first ever control the group has had of a Yellowhammer - ring number L203943. The best of the retraps was a Reed Bunting from 2006. A Moorhen added another non-passerine to the list. The full capture list was (new/retrap): Dunnock 1/1, Chaffinch 2/2, Blue Tit 0/2, Yellowhammer 1/2, Great Tit 0/2, Blackbird 1/0, Robin 1/0, Reed Bunting 2/3, Goldfinch 1/0, Moorhen 1/0.

Kev

Granby, Saturday 25 February

Duncan, Ruth & myself did visit 13 of the winter to Granby yesterday. Weather was frosty early on, stayed mainly cloudy with the breeze building up later. Overall, quite pleasant and topped up my 'farmers' tan. The spring-like weather had the Skylarks & Dunnocks singing aplenty, and we were treated to three Buzzards drifting by.

As per the last visit visit, the mild weather inevitably shaped the make-up and size of the catch, with 70 birds processed. Great & Blue Tits made up three-fifths of the catch, and about a third of them were new birds. Highlights included: two pairs of paired up Long-tailed Tits, our fifth Treecreeper this winter, and the oldest Blue Tit (T513715) that's been handled at the site at 5y 9m 5d which has now been caught 14 times! The only other retrap of note was another Blue Tit from 2008.

Full catch numbers were 35/35 (new/retrap): Dunnock 0/1, Robin 1/0, Blackbird 0/1, Long-tailed Tit 3/1, Blue Tit 3/11, Great Tit 9/19, Treecreeper 1/0, Chaffinch 11/2, Tree Sparrow 0/1, Yellowhammer 6/0.

Jim

 A fairly typical first winter female Yellowhammer (5F) with dark bases to the crown feathers and with well worn tertials and pointed tail. (JL)

 A young male Chaffinch (5M) providing an excellent opportunity to compare adult-type tertials (replaced on left wing - black with a well defined pink-orange fringe) with juvenile tertials (retained on right wing - brown with worn buffy fringe). (JL)

Congratulations Ruth!

Now officially a C Permit holder. Birds of Chesterfield prepare to meet thy ringer...

Daneshill Landfill Site with NNRG, Monday 20 February

A bang on gull cannon netting session today at Daneshill Landfill Site nr Retford. Duncan, Mick & myself wore our North Notts RG hard hats, rigger boots & high-viz jackets (a bit YMCA I know), for the first ever gull cannon session in Nottinghamshire. The team of 14 was also made up of ringers from Sorby Breck RG & Essex.

The site has quite a small tipping area, but there was just enough room to set a net away from the refuse trucks, and the spiky driver very obligingly spread a nice lot of domestic waste in front of the net. The gulls were mad for it, and once a jiggler was set up to keep the small gulls out of the safety zone, a quick catch was taken of 235 gulls. Species totals were: Greater Black-backed Gull - 23; Herring Gull - 28, plus a first winter control from Russia (only been about 20 of those apparently); Common Gull - 5, Black-headed Gull - 176, plus two controls (one British & the other Sweden). Several of the Herring Gulls were the Scandinavian sub-species argentatus, and another bird was a probable 1st winter Yellow-legged Gull (pictures taken for verification).

Most of the big gulls had yellow darvics and some of the Black-headed Gulls had red darvics fitted to their left legs, so please look out for them.

Considering it was a new ringing site, a new team and Jez Blackburn's fourth time out cannon netting the gulls, the session went blindingly well, which says an awful lot about Jez and the way everyone else mucked in.

Jim

Rushcliffe Country Park, Sunday 20 February

Yet another poor catch at RCP. We finished on only 25 birds, 14 of which were retraps. The best of the retraps being a Yellowhammer from 2006 - which we also caught last week! The full capture list was (new/retrap): Dunnock 0/1, Chaffinch 0/1, Blue Tit 1/1, Yellowhammer 4/6, Great Tit 2/0, Blackbird 2/1, Robin 0/2, Reed Bunting 1/0, Lesser Redpoll 0/1, Goldfinch 0/1, Woodpigeon 1/0.

Kev

Dunham-on-Trent, Sunday 19 February

Mick and I wore our North Notts RG hats today, and went cannon-netting Wigeon near the Trent at Dunham. Adrian & Jez Blackburn fired at first light before the Greylags pushed the less than expected Wigeon off the bait in the catching area. Catch was two Greylag Geese, 24 Wigeon (two retraps) and one Carrion Crow. Four of the Wigeon were fitted with wing tags which should help to find out more about their winter movements. We caught about half the Wigeon present, which is a good ratio, but there had been 100 plus when we were setting the nets yesterday.

Jim

 6M Wigeon being fitted with it's wing tag.(JL)

The less glamorous side of ringing - cleaning the brash out of the cannon nets when putting them away. (JL)

Holme Pierrepont, Friday 17 February

Jim, Duncan & I had a go at netting Reed Buntings at roost on Friday night. This is an easy way of catching a good number of birds as long as it's not windy and the birds are roosting in the right spot. Unfortunately it was windy and most of the birds were roosting elsewhere. However, we caught six birds: 4 new female Reed Buntings, a single retrap adult male (from two yrs ago) and a retrap Wren.

Nevertheless, we had a very pleasant evening, with quite a few birds around - at least 500 Wigeon, several Gadwall and Teal, the odd Common Snipe and single Woodcock and Shelduck.


Pete

Ian's pale Buzzard

Ian Kerton is a ringer in our area and he's been catching a few Fieldfares in his back garden in the cold weather. At one point some birds that were in the net proved a good lure for a local Buzzard which Ian then managed to pounce on. For anyone in the Cropwell Bishop area, it is a well known individual as it is so distinctively pale.

Nest-finding

This was recently posted in the Nest Record Scheme forum:

"A couple of interesting figures I've just pulled out for the next Nest Record News: over 300 new recorders have started sending in records since 2008 and these recorders alone have submitted over 7,000 nest records so far for the 2011 season (overall total 37,252 records).

I think that's fantastic news and it makes me all the more pleased to announce that four more nest finding training courses are available this summer. Details are now on the web:

www.bto.org/volunteer-surveys/nrs/taking-part/training-courses

The courses are aimed at both new and established ringers/recorders wanting to improve their nest finding skills. If you know anyone who might like to attend a course, please pass the message on.

A big thanks to recorders Richard Castell, Tony Davis and David Oliver for agreeing to tutor the courses once more.

Carl Barimore
Nest Record Scheme"

Granby, Thursday 16 February

 A young male Greenfinch - an increasingly rare find in the nets. (PML)

Duncan, Pete and myself made visit 12 of the winter to Granby today. Weather was mild for a change, overcast and a little breezy (but not at the feeders). Bird sightings wise, it was fairly quiet with singleton Linnet, Buzzard and Siskin overhead, about 80 Fieldfare and a dozen or so Skylarks, one or two of which were starting to sing a little.

The mild weather inevitably led a much smaller catch of 65 birds compared to the 150 odd in the snow previously; with Chaffinches and Yellowhammers well down. More than half the birds were retraps, with only one bird, a four year old Blackbird, being ringed earlier than the winter of 2010/11. There were a lot of new tits to ring, and they are maybe moving about more now as they look to take up territories. Probably the highlight of a quiet morning was ringing our fourth Treecreeper of the winter; nae bad considering we've only ringed seven here previously.

Full catch numbers were 30/35 (new/retrap): Dunnock 3/1, Robin 2/3, Blackbird 1/2, Blue Tit 5/9, Great Tit 8/13, Greenfinch 0/1, Chaffinch 2/2, Yellowhammer 5/4, Reed Bunting 2/0.

Jim
 

 Probably the start of a case of viral papilloma - a disease which results in odd deformities of the foot in several species, and regularly in Chaffinches as here. Such birds are released unringed. (PML)

 An interesting case of a growth bar indicating that an individual must be an adult. The feather weaknesses on this Yellowhammer's outer primaries were the same on both wings and the staggered pattern shows that they were grown in sequence and not all together as you'd see on a young bird. (PML)