brewood ringers - Latest Blog Entries

Belvide Nest Boxes

Thu, 17 May 2012 17:10:00 +0100

BELVIDE NEST BOXES 2012
The nest-boxes were checked on the evening of 16th May—in an unusually quiet period of weather within a long period of grime!
Despite the poor weather, and despite poor results from such schemes nearby, the results were quite encouraging. It seems as though most of the birds have waited and managed to hatch broods just as the weather (we hope) is getting slightly better for feeding.
Overall take-up is a little down on last year-as is brood size; but only 2 nests contained dead chicks, which was pleasingly much fewer than anticipated based on reports from elsewhere. A small number of nests had been used early and appeared to have fledged successfully, and one brood fledged on our arrival, but most of the others had recently hatched chicks which were too young to ring. The Tree Sparrows are busy building, with only 2 of their nests having eggs—although not yet complete clutches. The new banks of nest-boxes for this species are working well. One bank of 5 boxes has 3 sparrow nests and the other two banks of 3 have at least one sparrow each.
Next winter we need to do a bit of work to replace some of the boxes which are damaged.
Results:-
80 nest-boxes checked, of which 66 were available for occupation—11 were damaged and 3 were playing host to nests of wood mice.
Of the 66 available boxes 37 were used—55+%
Of these, 22 were occupied by Blue Tits; 10 by Great tits and 4 by Tree Sparrows
Average brood sizes were:-
Blue Tit 7.5 ( range 3-14) Great Tit 6 ( range 1-7)

Annual Lundy Trip

Sun, 13 May 2012 21:01:00 +0100

A few team members spent a week on Lundy last week--the latest in a 30 year sequence of visits. Although the weather was wacky--it seemed to have stirred up the migrants and in between the showers and big downpours we managed to catch over 1400 birds--the second highest total ever. Highlights were 400+ of Blackcap and Willow warbler, with Pied and Spotted Flycatchers, as well as a supporting cast of all the commoner warblers. Undoubted highlight was the full adult male Golden Oriole!! I guess we'll just have to go again--what a bind!

Wood Warbler & Tree Pipit

Tue, 08 May 2012 10:35:00 +0100

Jim Stewart had an excellent day ringing last week when he caught both Wood Warbler and Tree Pipit on Cannock Chase

Herons

Mon, 30 Apr 2012 12:15:00 +0100

A recent visit to a local heronry made up for the lack of activity when a number of chicks were ringed. Peter and Keith getting to grips with the robust chicks.

Ravens

Wed, 18 Apr 2012 11:30:00 +0100

On Tuesday 17.04.12 Jim arranged the ringing of Raven chicks which allowed some of the group to ring this species. A big thanks from all who participated to Jim for arranging this session. A very pleased Dave and Keith with two of the Raven chicks.

Bits and pieces

Tue, 17 Apr 2012 14:12:00 +0100

This is always a bit of a frustrating time of year--waithing for the main season in early July--but there are a few things happening:-

First congratulations to Scott Petrek who is the latest trainee to move on to his C licence. In the last few weeks we have had a welcome influx of trainees-4 to be precise. here is only one problem with this--3 of them are called Ben!! so we will have to sort out some way of knowing who we are talking to. We ran a simple session at a local feeder on Sunday afternoon just to give them a taster and keep them interested, because we know how frustrating it can be trying to start a new hobby when there's actually nothing much to do. They all sampled the delights of Blue and Great in the hand and it hasn't put them off.

Some of us got a British ringing tick last week when Jim found a lovely brood of Woodlarks ready to ring. Our Schedule 1 licence came in really handy for the 3 smashing chicks in the nest. jim has found a second bird building so fingers crossed. He's also involving local ringers this week in helping ring several broods of Ravens on the Chase--and he has started catching Tree Pipits as they arrive--but so far none of the colour ringed birds from last year. Now we are anxiously waiting the return of Nightjars....... More news as and when things happen.

John Cameron Memorial

Sun, 15 Apr 2012 18:03:00 +0100

On Sunday 15.04.2012 a tree was planted in memory of John by his wife Marcia and two children Catherine and Elizabeth in an area of the Churnet Valley, Staffordshire where John spent many hours ringing. Marcia is grateful to Jim for arranging the tree and site for the planting ceremony which was attended by Peter, Colin, Keith, Dave and Paul and many stories were exchanged regarding ringing expeditions John made and his contribution to the ringing scheme.

Reed Bunts keep coming!

Thu, 01 Mar 2012 20:07:00 +0000

We had another session at the reed-beds at Belvide this evening and caught another 32 new birds and 9 retraps; showing that there are still new birds coming through the reserve--we have caught over 350 since the end of October 2011!! We also caught another 4 Redwing coming into a Blackthorn roost.

Feeders in action at last

Thu, 02 Feb 2012 19:51:00 +0000

Tuesday saw us try at the feeder station on the Chase for the first time this winter. I miscalculated sunrise and we got there about half an hour too late--the site erupted with birds as we arrived. Two nets were quickly erected and the first catch was very good with 34 birds of a good range of species including 3 cracking male Brambling, 6 Redpoll including a control 5 Bullfinch and 4 Robin. Things dropped off quickly after the first catch and we ended up with a slightly disappointing 54 new birds, with quite a few Chaffinch--but no Siskin or Goldfinch--nor any more Brambling. However, the site looks good for a while yet, especially as these cold temperatures persist

Early activities

Tue, 24 Jan 2012 10:58:00 +0000

It has been a very mild winter and feeding stations and roosts have been generally quiet--with a couple of exceptions. The first exception has been the Reed Bunting roost at Belvide. We have had 2 visits in 2012 and ringed another 25 new birds bringing the total number of new birds ringed in the reeds since the end of october to almost 350! This is many more than we expected, and an analysis of the retraps shows that some birds are hanging around while there is a definite in/outflow of birds. We hope that some of these will be recaptured by others to see just wher they are coming from.

Secondly, the mild weather has kept a lot of Redwing in the area since they have not carried on south to France/Spain. A large Blackthorn bush is being favoured as a roost site by this species and to date we have ringed 30 birds over the last few weeks--not a lot, but more than we have ever done at Belvide.

Team members have carried out a couple of very successful public demonstrations at Northicote Farm catching lots of birds and enthusing lots of visitors, great news.

Finally, we have been getting some tips from Tony Cross in mid Wales who has shown us how to catch roosting waders--we hope to ba able to emulate him this year--watch this space!

Yet more Reed Buntings

Thu, 22 Dec 2011 18:38:00 +0000

A small group of us used the really mild conditions this afternoon to have another try at the larger reedbed at Belvide--and try a couple of nets by the Redwing roost bush. 17 new reed bunts and 4 redwing was a decent catch for not a lot of effort. It gave our trainees some great experience of the whole process at a steady pace. probably no more until after Boxing day--but you never know...

Sorry for no updates

Wed, 21 Dec 2011 10:44:00 +0000

Many apologies for lack of updates--no excuses other than bone-ideleness. Anyway, various members of the group have been engaged in several activities since the last blog posting:-

Several trips to the reedbeds at Belvide have resulted in record-breaking catches of Reed Bunting, with a current total of just under 250 new birds with 2 controls from where we don't as yet know. We are trying again soon so we will let readers know the final 2011 tally.

A small group put on a ringing demonstration for Wolverhampton City Council on Saturday. Very successful it was too, with quite a few visitors, and lots of birds both for the visitors to see--and for our trainees to get experience. Most of the birds were tits, but some Greenfinch, Goldfinch, Great spotted Woodpeckers added variety and interest.

Glynn and colin visited our friend Fergus in deepest Worcestershire on a bright crisp morning last Sunday. he has found a superb orchard with lots of apples still around. We had 10 Fieldfare and a good selection of 14 species totalling 50 birds. This site will be really good if ever we get a really hard sustained frost because the thrushes will pour in to feed on the apples. We have found that they prefer feeding on invertebrates, then berries with apples as a last resort.

Trips to the new site at Aqualate have been a bit disappointing with 28 Starlings the biggest catch ( out of about 40,000!!). However, it's early days and we are still getting to know the site. We are looking to 2012 to reallt start generating some interesting results.

Last night a select band tried a new venture at Belvide. We had suspected that Redwing were roosting in a big Blackthorn stand so we gave it a try. Bingo. 12 Redwing, 2 Song thrush and a Sparrowhawk.

You win some, you lose some!

Sun, 13 Nov 2011 20:48:00 +0000

We've had a couple of reedbed roost sessions this week with very different results. On Thursday we tried for the Starling roost at Aqualate. Only a small number of nets because we didn't want to get swamped by the several thousand birds roosting. No need to fear, they all dropped in on the opposite side of the lake. final score= 2 Reed bunting!

Tonight we went back to Belvide and caught 45 new Reed bunting in the Scott hide reedbed, with 3 retraps from 2 weeks ago. this means we have ringed around 140 of this species roosting at the reserve--and given the small number of retraps it suggests that there is a bit of movement through the site. we will give it another couple of weeks and try again

Pastures (reedbeds) new

Sun, 30 Oct 2011 20:11:00 +0000

It looks like the Redpoll bonanza is over for now. We are sure that later we will start to catch big numbers at our feeders--but for now the birds are using natural food mainly in the form of birch seeds. So swe have moved on to reedbed roosts especially for Reed Bunting and a little later--Starlings. We had our first session this evening at Belvide and managed enough ringers to net in both reedbeds. Good job we had so many folk--the buntings simply poured into the nets especially in the reeds outside the Scott hide. Final score was 96 new birds with 9 retraps--most we think from Belvide but so far we have not hecked them all out. A bonus was a young male Blackcap. We will leave the reeds for about a month now--unless the Starling roost develops. On Tuesday we are trying a new reedbed--deatils later.

Getting a bit blase now

Thu, 20 Oct 2011 20:46:00 +0100

We had another session on the Chase hoping for Redpoll again today, but only ringed 38 new birds. At any other time this would be regarded as a superb catch, but after the numbers we have been having recently--we were a tad disappointed! This may herald the end of the passage--or else just a day when birds weren't moving for some reason. Some of the boys are trying again tomorrow just to check this out. What was noticable was the number of Chaffinch and Brambling feeding on the abundant beechmast this year--lets hope they stick around for a good while and end up roosting in our rhododendron patch.

They keep on coming!

Mon, 17 Oct 2011 18:50:00 +0100

Yet another trip onto the Chase today for a full day session after Redpoll. Yet again the flocks kept migrating up the Birches Valley with 207 new birds ringed, plus one control from a british site as yet unknown. We also finally managed to encourage 6 Crossbills to drink at our pool which made for several ringing 'tick' for the team--pictures are on the previous blog. We have now ringed almost 1500 Redpoll--when will they stop? Not for a while we hope

Crossbills

Mon, 17 Oct 2011 14:12:00 +0100

Redpolls keep coming but today the catch included the elusive Crossbill and a photo of Jim with a cracking male. The four trapped during the morning session were visiting a small drinking pond.

Redpolls everywhere

Tue, 11 Oct 2011 21:24:00 +0100

A few of the groupd joined Jim on the Chase today for a mega bash at Redpoll. Using one 30ft net and one 20ft net about 50m apart--each with a sound system underneath, we managed to ring 299 new birds!! The site appears to be on a migration/dispersal route as new birds kept coming all day long. We had no same day or same site retraps suggesting that birds were moving through and continued on their way after ringing. The weather was pretty appalling for ringing with strong winds all day, but fortunately the 8year old Corsican pines were close enough to give some protection. This session was the sixth in recent days and brings the total of new redpoll ringed to 1100!! To date there have only been 2 same site retraps, 1 control, but no Common ( Mealy) redpoll in the catch--they have all been the smaller, shorter winged Lesser Redpoll.

Home and Away--Again!!

Sun, 09 Oct 2011 19:04:00 +0100

A couple of group members spent a family 'non-ringing' week on my favourite island--Lundy. Weather conditions prevented mass ringing ( on those occasions when family matters allowed) but on two days the conditions did produce masses of birds. On Tuesday it quickly became apparent that there had been a fall of migrants-mainly Blackcaps and Chiffchaffs. During the day we ringed 240 new birds in 2 forty foot nets. Hundreds of birds were about. During the week we ringed 530 birds with other main species being Swallow, Meadow Pipit and Goldcrest. We didn't manage any of the 2 rarities on the island--Rosy Starling and Wryneck. But as luck would have it, as we handed over on the last Saturday to other friends--they caught a Common Rosefinch within an hour of arrival--typical!!

Back home we were getting reports from Jim who was having fantastic success with Lesser Redpoll at our forest site. In the last 2 weeks he has ringed 691 new birds with last Thursady being a mega day with almost 300 in a couple of nets simply by using a recording of their song. Redpolls at this time of year simply seem incapable of resisting the sound of their song. In tthe coming months we should be getting some recoveries of these birds and be able to build a picture of their movements.

Home and Away

Thu, 29 Sep 2011 13:01:00 +0100

Several team members travelled to Portugal last week for our 5th annual ringing expedition to Vilamoura. Unfortunately Pete and the 'home' team had a very disappointing time at Belvide with 2 catching sessions netting fewer than 50 birds in total--with no sign of any Meadow Pipits in the nets--a species which we had been expecting to ring in big numbers.

It can't have been easy the, receiving texts from those of us in Portugal ringing big numbers of exciting birds. In summary, 1941 new birds, with an additional 5 controls of birds ringed in France Belgium and Germany, illustrating the international importance of the Vilamoura reedbed for passage and wintering birds. Some of the highlights were--a Booted Eagle, 4 Kestrel, 6 Red Necked Nightjar,8 Hoopoe,334 Red Rumped Swallow,84 Yellow Wagtail,40 Bluethroat,28 Whinchat,93 Cettis warbler,206 Reed warbler, 32 Subalpine warbler, 2 Woodchat Shrike, 38 Spotless Starling, 91 Willow warbler and 1 Spectacled warbler--whjat a great week!! Roll on next year.