Portstewart Strand 09/04/2015

I was by myself today so I only set the East ride and a couple of the gorse singles/doubles.  It was a misty start but it burnt off by 8am and turned into a very sunny day.  The wind also picked up through the morning making the nets a little obvious.  There had been an arrival of birds with 20+ Willow Warbler, 3 Chiffchaff, c30 Swallows and 8 Wheatear.  The catching was pretty slow with 11 new birds and 5 retraps but it's always nice to get the first Chiffchaff of the year plus two Willow Warbler.

The first Chiffchaff of the year

A couple of the Wheatears found one of the traps and spent 5 minutes hopping around it trying to get to the meal worms but couldn't find the entrance hole on top!  I should hopefully pick up one or two in the coming weeks. 

Ringing Totals 09/04/2015

                             New         Retrap

Blackbird                1                1

Chiffchaff               1

Dunnock                 3

Goldcrest                1

Lesser Redpoll       1

Meadow Pipit         1

Robin                      1                 1

Song Thrush                              1

Willow Warbler      2

Wren                                         2

Total                      11                5