Up on the north coast, it was a very cold start at -1°C, with the net guys frozen solid, frozen puddles and really cold metal mist nets poles, which can be almost painful to work with! The skies remained clear all morning with glorious sunshine and blue skies, with the temperature rising 9°C by 10am. The conditions were a little kinder for mist netting in Gortin with a little bit of cloud cover.
Willow Warbler
It was apparent that the first wave of Willow Warblers arrived through the week with 8+ singing males around 'East Ride' at Portstewart Strand and a few at the River Site. John caught two new birds and I managed only a single returning bird, originally ringed on the 13th of April last year.
As you can see from the totals it was a very quiet morning for all three of us with 29 birds combined - 10 from PSS, 11 at Gortin and 8 at the Uni. There was very little movement around the nets with the birds busy singing and staking out territories.
Combined ringing totals 09/04/2016
New Retraps
Blackbird 4
Chaffinch 3
Coal Tit 4
Dunnock 1 2
Goldfinch 1
Great Tit 2 1
Robin 4
Willow Warbler 2 1
Wren 3 1
Total 20 9
Chaffinch
Over the weekend I added three patch ticks for the year at the Bann Estuary, raising the total up to 89 species. The new ticks included the Willow Warblers at Portstewart Strand, 12 Sand Martins at the colony across the river at Grangemore, plus a single Swallow.
Check out the link below for updates on the Patchwork Challenge across Ireland:
On another note, the blog has now passed the 5000 views mark and still climbing!
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