Mid January Ringing

On Sunday morning, John, Steve and I headed down to Antrim to meet with the guys from Copeland Bird Observatory for the next instalment of their winter ringing training program.  It is a great opportunity for trainees who visit the Obs to get in some extra ringing and keep themselves well practised over the closed season.  I had been eagerly anticipating the freezing forecast conditions for the weekend but they didn't materialise, particularly on Sunday when the forecast -8°C came in at +5°C.  The plus side was safer driving conditions and all fingers & toes are still attached. 

The site was heaving with birds on arrival around 8.30 with large flocks of finches drifting about.  There were much fewer thrushes around, compared to the last visit but a flock of c30 Redwing  appeared late in the morning and a flock of mixed thrushes were noted in the open fields on departure. 
The catch itself was much smaller than previous visits but it was nice to get 11 Lesser Redpoll following a record year at the Observatory with over 500 ringed and also 7 Linnet from the cereal cover crop. 

Ringing Totals   17/01/2016                                     
                                      
                                      New       Retraps          

Blackbird                       1                1

Blue Tit                          2                3

Chaffinch                       3             

Coal Tit                                            2         

Great Tit                        5                6

Goldcrest                       1                1

Goldfinch                       4                                                                           

Lesser Redpoll             11               2

Linnet                             7

 

Total                              34              15       

  

 

 

 On Saturday morning I opened the nets in the garden bright and early in cold and crisp conditions.  I only had the nets open for around an hour before the rain started and I had to close up.  I had opted for an extra 12m net, so the rain was probably a blessing in disguise as the birds were coming thick and fast and I only have one pair of hands.  The catch was decent for the limited time and it was pleasing to ring another three Siskins.  The majority of the retraps were from the last session but there were two Great Tits from Dec 2012, who would appear to be a pair. 

 

 

Ringing Totals   16/01/2016                                     

                                      
                                      New       Retraps          

 

Blue Tit                          4                8

Chaffinch                       6             

Coal Tit                          2                6         

Dunnock                        1    

Great Tit                        4                5                                                               

Long-tailed Tit              1                1

Robin                                               1  

Siskin                             3

 

Total                              21              21       

 

 

Ken also had a one to one session in his garden for one of his trainees on Saturday, but like myself, were held up by the rain.  They were able to open the nets in the scrub after 1pm and managed to process 22 birds

 

Irish Bird Ringing Data - Owls

In Ireland we generally have three breeding species of Owl - Barn, Long-eared, Short-eared Owls and have had a couple of rare visitors in Little, Scops and Snowy Owls.   Little Owl is the only species not to have been ringed and the minimal records may have been as a result of a failed, non official, introduction.
A single Scops Owl was ringed in Ireland in 1999 at Cape Clear - a further 8 have been ringed in Britain since 1909. 
The Snowy Owl is a rare winter visitor to Ireland, although the odd bird has taken up residence out west and they have even attempted to breed.  The data is a little unclear as there are suggestions that there were four pullus ringed in 2002 but the BTO don't seem to have a record of this.  A pair was confirmed to have attempted breeding in 2001 but failed with four eggs, so the potential is there, but unlikely.  There was certainly one adult male Snowy Owl ringed in 2002.  A total of 29 have been ringed in Britain since 1909, although the majority of these were nestlings from the breeding pair in Shetland between 1967 and 1975.     



Barn Owl

Across much of Ireland the Barn Owl is a scarce breeder with the greatest concentrations in the southwest.  There are as few as 40-50 pairs across the whole of Northern Ireland.

A total of 670 Barn Owls were ringed in Ireland since 1977 and you can see from the graph below that it is in the past eight years when the majority were caught.  This data is not representative of populations but is down to the real effort made by the guys in Duhallow (more info below) and also the erection of hundreds of owl boxes.  Of those birds ringed, only two were caught in Northern Ireland.  A further two were ringed in 2015 when Barn Owls bred in an owl box in Northern Ireland for the first time.  Many more boxes have been going up in suitable locations in the past few years and it is hoped these will help boost the breeding populations.  There's nothing much we can do with the wet & windy Irish climate and the lack of voles but we could improve the habitats and cut back on poisons/toxins.   

Ringing recoveries show a main movement of birds from southwest Scotland, with four birds ringed as nestlings in Dumfries and Galloway relocating to Ireland.  The Welsh bird from Anglesey was also ringed as a nestling.  The bird ringed on the Yorkshire coast is interesting because it was a first year bird when it was trapped in mid September, although there are no details in regards to race.  The European race 'Dark-breasted' Barn Owl (Tyto alba guttata) has been recorded in Ireland but long distance Barn Owl migration still remains a rare occurrence across the world. 
All of the recoveries have been in relation to dead birds with four road casualties, one hit by a plane and one long-dead in a derelict building. 

Barn Owl movements into Ireland

The guys in Duhallow have been doing some great work on Barn Owls and other raptors in recent years and probably account for the majority of Barn Owls ringed in Ireland - check out these blogs for more info...

http://www.irishraptors.blogspot.ie/



http://duhallow.blogspot.co.uk/

Long-eared Owl

                           Long-eared Owl                            (JC)


 

LEO is the most common and widespread Owl in Ireland but is seldom seen because of its inconspicuous nocturnal nature.  The numbers are boosted in winter when there is an arrival of birds from the north/east.
Since 1975, 151 LEO have been ringed in Ireland with at least 50 of those ringed in the north.  Before this period there were five ringed at Copeland BO & two at Cape Clear BO.  There are no obvious trends in the catch graph, but like Barn Owl, this will be down to effort by ringers.  Adult LEOs are quite difficult to catch and many of the records of these refer to birds caught at the coastal sites on migration.  The majority of the records are pulli ringed in nests and with clutch sizes up to six eggs, it can really increase the number caught in one year.

The recoveries of Long-eared Owl into Ireland are rather few but they do show a nice range of the movements.  The first of these comes as a passage migrant from Helgoland, Germany, which could have potentially come from anywhere but most likely out of Scandinavia via Denmark.  The second bird came through Orkney and probably made the jump from Norway.  Both these birds were caught in subsequent years after initial ringing, so possibly could have migrated multiple times but it is difficult to say.  The third bird was ringed in a nest in central Scotland and was recovered in its first winter. 
The only movement out of Ireland was a bird ringed as a chick in Phoenix Park in Dublin, which was controlled at the Calf of Man Bird Observatory.  It is perhaps not a movement you would expect, with the bird heading north east in November in its second year. 



Long-eared Owls movements into and out of Ireland

Short-eared Owl


The SEO is generally a winter migrant to Ireland, with birds from Scandinavia and Scotland. One or two pairs breed every other year in some of the upland areas.  The Antrim Hills have been a relatively reliable area since 1997.  The success is said to be down to the accidental introduction of Field Voles into the area via bags of conifer saplings, brought over by a Scottish forestry company.  The proximity to the breeding birds in Dumfries and Galloway and the Scottish Borders probably boosts the Irish breeding population.
During the period of 1977 to 2014 there were only 10 SEOs ringed in Ireland, all in the south, plus at least one ringed in 1965 and at least one caught in late 2015 - more information on this bird is available below
 http://midwalesringers.blogspot.co.uk/2015/11/irish-aa-in-red.html


Like the LEO, there are only three records (available to me at least) of birds moving into Ireland.  The only foreign recovery was a bird from Ikaalinen, Turku-Pori, Finland in an impressive movement of at least 2311 km.  This bird was ringed as nestling in June 1988 and recovered dead the following April in southwest Cork.  The other two birds were ringed as chicks in central Scotland and both headed to Ireland in their first winter, and as with most owls, were found dead, unfortunately the bird in Wexford was shot.  It would be quite interesting to know where Irish born SEOs go...



Short-eared Owls movements into Ireland

Potentially there were five Snowy Owls in 2002 but I can only confirm one, so I am being cautious and including just the single bird.  

Nordic Sanderlings and Ringing Update

Last weekend John and myself managed to fit in a quick session at Castlerock Golf Club to target the flock of Fieldfare that have been feeding on the Sea buckthorn berries.  The conditions were decent but the rain started early, so we headed for home at 10am.  The nets were open before first light and it was in the first couple of rounds that we caught a few birds. 
The catch was small with another four Bullfinch, one Blackbird, one Wren, One Dunnock and a single Fieldfare. 

Fieldfare

Whilst down at the estuary we checked out a very approachable (within 5m) flock of c40 Sanderling feeding on a small pool behind the west mole of the Barmouth.  We noticed a couple of colour ringed birds in amongst the flock and spent a bit of time trying to clinch the correct ring combinations (2 colour rings on each tarsus and flag on tibia).  It wasn't the easiest thing to do as they really don't sit still and the rings on the tarsus were submerged for the majority of the time. 
The first bird (green) was ringed in Iceland near Sandgerði, on the Southern Peninsula in May 2010.  This bird was subsequently sighted wintering in Britany, France in 2010 & 2012. 
The second bird (red) was ringed in eastern Greenland close to the Hochstetter Foreland, near Shannon Island in July 2012.  It too was recorded wintering in France in upper Normandy in 2012 and Brittany in 2014.

 Colour ringed Sanderling movements

I had entered the details in to Animal Track - https://animaltrack.org/ and both birds were registered but a question mark was raised for both by the project manager.  Sanderling are known to be very site faithful in winter and these two birds were expected to be along the English Channel once again, rather than some 7° further north on the north coast of NI.  Up until a few days ago it had been the mildest winter on record in Northern Ireland so it may have encouraged a few birds to winter further north.  The current cold weather across Northern Europe seems to be getting a few things moving with divers, ducks, geese, swans etc. arriving into the British Isles in recent days, so the Sanderling may yet move on.           

Part of the Sanderling flock 

  I kicked off my Patchwork Challenge at the Bann Estuary for 2016 during the weekend and notched up 48 species including the sometimes difficult to tick Greenfinch and Rock Pipit.  The weather this weekend is set to be dry and calm with temperatures forecast to drop to -8°C in some parts of the country, so we hope to get out and make the most of the conditions with the Copeland Bird Observatory Crew on Sunday.

Christmas Ringing 2015

 Over the Christmas period we managed to get out on a few dry mornings and set up a new ringing site at Castlerock Golf Club.  It is the same scrub habitat as our Portstewart Strand (PSS) ringing site but on a much smaller scale.  The lure of the site is that the Sea Buckthorn differs (apparently all the bushes are female??) from PSS in that they are laden in berries, whereas the bushes are now bare at PSS.  Whatever the difference is, the area is full of birds feeding on the hundreds of thousands of berries.  The new site is on the other side of the estuary from PSS and only a distance of 450 metres as the Bullfinch flies but by road/foot some 17.8 kilometres.   

We have now cut 39 metres of net rides and hope to use the site until the berries are gone.  The scrub has its own population of breeding warblers and the potential for migrants, so it may be used through the main season alongside PSS.  While cutting the net rides we stuck up a couple of nets and managed to catch a few birds.  Three of those were retrap Bullfinches ringed at PSS, one from 2014 and two from 2015.  One of the Blackbirds was a monster continental bird with a wing of 138mm and a decent weight of 120.5 grams.  The target species was the flock of c40 Fieldfare but unfortunately we didn't connect with them.  Maybe next time. 

Blackbird

 

Ringing Totals    27+29/12/2015                                 
                                      
                                       New        Retraps         

Blackbird                        3

Blue Tit                           1

Bullfinch                         5                 3

Chaffinch                        2

Song Thrush                   1         

                                                          

Total                               12                3      

Apologies for the shadow but the picture sets the scene with the open Atlantic Ocean to the North

 On the 3rd of January I managed my first session of 2016 and started the winter ringing in the  garden.  I had been pretty slack in topping up the feeders, leaving them empty for a day or two, but I was a bit more consistent over Christmas and the numbers have been building.  The conditions on the morning were quite windy but the single 12m net was mostly sheltered.  The rain started around 10am and cut short the ringing.

Siskin

 
The catch was distinctly average but it was very pleasing to get the first (hopefully of many) Siskin of the winter, following the 36 caught in the garden late Feb to mid March last year.  I also caught my regular male Sparrowhawk and it is now the fourth time he has been caught since Jan 2014.  It has bounced from the nets a few times also and would have again this time had I not been standing below it extracting a Blue Tit.  I'll have to wait until February before the finches start to arrive in any numbers.  I was very surprised to re-catch only one Tit considering there have been over 500 ringed here in the past few years and they are usually much more prevalent in catches.   

Sparrowhawk

Ringing Totals   03/01/2016                                     
                                      
                                      New       Retraps          

 

Blue Tit                         11

Chaffinch                       3             

Coal Tit                          5                1         

Great Tit                         6                                                               

Robin                              1  

Siskin                              1

Sparrowhawk                                  1

 

Total                               27              2       

 

 

I will hopefully post the groups ringing totals for the year in the next few weeks but I am just waiting for the guys to submit their data on IPMR.  I have also started the next post on the Irish Bird Ringing data which will cover the Owls.  I have now received all the data from Cape Clear BO and a portion from Copeland BO, so I've been a little distracted compiling it all.