I met Alice and John at 5:00 a.m. yesterday, to ease us back into ringing at the pools at the Obs, it could easily have been an hour earlier, but it was early enough. As we put the nets up, we had just 1 okta cloud cover, but by the time we packed up five hours later, we had full cloud cover. The wind was a hardly noticeable north-easterly, so perfect conditions for mist nets.
We ringed 34 birds as follows (recaptures in brackets):
Reed Warbler - 3 (2)
Cetti's Warbler - 4
Robin - 3
Blackcap - 3
Reed Bunting - 1
Great Tit - 4
Whitethroat - 2
Lesser Whitethroat - 1
Dunnock - 2
Chiffchaff - 3
Long-tailed Tit - 8 (1)
All the Cetti's Warblers, Blackcaps, Whitethroats and Chiffchaffs were juvenile birds, whilst the Reed Warblers and Lesser Whitethroat were adults. Probably indicative of a later arrival, and therefore later breeding season, for the latter two species this year.
Reed Warbler
From a birding perspective, I don't have a great deal to report as we were kept fairly busy with the ringing. Ten Swifts were notable, as was a Great Spotted Woodpecker flying from the houses to the more mature planting surrounding the water treatment works. The scrape was quiet with just a handful of Coots and a Little Grebe.
The forecast is looking settled all week, so I am hoping to get another session in before weekend, after I have got my final breeding bird survey out of the way.
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