The Weekend

Saturday
While Dr O slept off the excess of the previous night's celebrations after handing in his PhD Thesis, Billy Whizz, Lady Morgan, Thon and Facey headed to the bay on Saturday for what would be a very quiet morning. It was slower than the 15 black slugs counted on the track. Combined. Slower than Facey's congnitive abilities without coffee.

We ended with the details of a mere 13 birds gracing the notebook. Only two proper migrants, chiffs of course, were in the mix. Lots of blue and great tits... We did catch three blabi at once (This was highlight...) which were likely to be birds moving through. Bird of the day was awarded to a Cetti's, although it would have gone to the male sparrowhawk that graced our net but decided that it would save collecting its unquiely numbered braclet for another day... perhaps he will bring his girlfriend with him next time? "Blackcap my dear and oh look, this bearded gentlemen has brought the ring I ordered for you..." A fly over house martin was unexpected.

Sunday
Sunday saw CJ at Forest Farm where he had more success Amoung the 23 bird he caught a nice little treecreeper. Bird of the day definitely went to the sole Nuthatch of the session - CJ's first!

A spot of spring trapping around the county, particularly on Sully Island, resulted in one frustrated ringer.

That Groppa

It almost goes without saying that The Cardiff Ringers are basically The A-team of the ringing world.
Let me explain...

Both consist of highly decorated renegades that appear to be wild and out of control but in fact have a deeply ingrained inner discipline and respect a military-like command structure.

Both always act on the side of the good and help the oppressed.

They both have Leuitenants with the callname 'Face'.

need I say more?

But the main way that they are akin to the A team is that they are available for hire as soldiers of fortune.

It was on one of these commissions that 'B.A. (Bearded Acrocephalus) Baracus Vafidis was out helping the good of Cardiff University and the oppressed of the Wildlife Trust, that he liberated this little traveller caught in a commie net- in desperate need of a ring on its leg and immediate enlistment into the BTO database. He took pity on the bird and obliged him his requests.

I love it when a plan comes together etc.

Mission Succesfull (obviously).

All quiet on the netting front

The session at the Bay was quiet and slow this morning, with the combined totals for bluti's and greti's out numbering chiffs. In fact residents out numbered migrant species in our 16 bird catch; a sure sign that the summer migrant tap is soon to drip dry.



An atmospheric picture of a mist net to emphasis mood. We were going to say it
represented the sun setting on migration but that would be a load of existentialist crap*.
Besides, the picture was taken at dawn....



Here are some views from the end of one of the rides. As we said, it was a quiet morning. Lots of tits.

* (The early 19th century philosopher Søren Kierkegaard, posthumously regarded as the father of existentialism, maintained that the individual has the sole responsibility for giving one's own life meaning and with living life passionately and sincerely, in spite of many obstacles and distractions including despair, angst, absurdity, choice, boredom, trainees, and blue tits. (CJ -Ed.))

Recovery News Special – Montagu’s Harrier!

Now we know some of you read that and got very excited but don’t be silly, when would we get to ring one of those?

Back in the 17 March this year, Dr O was busying himself collecting data for his PhD* at Dagana, Senegal. For some reason he let his attention stray from his studies and caught sight of a wing tagged Montagu’s Harrier. And low he did report it. (Well, after much trying to find out whom to report it too. Eventually he tracked down the bird’s tagger.)

EA644499 was ringed as a chick on 28-june-2007, at Le Clos Brien, 49, France. 993 days and 3717.8 kilometres later she was spotted by Dr O in Senegal. Birds eh? Got to love them

*entitled “Fings I likes about Wheatears by Adam Seward aged 33” and due to be handed in this week. As one of the group finishes a PhD, another starts one - circle of life people, circle of life.

Catching Curlew

A contingent of the Cardiff Ringers crossed the border into Lloger (that's England) to join in a catch of Curlew with members of SCAN and others.

With the nets set yesterday we just had to  turn up, cram ourselves in to the back of a Toyota thing (very cramped) and wait for the sound of canon fire. Then there was the very enjoyable fast drive to the catch field by Coker McRae.

Bailing out and running as fast as our wellie clad legs would lets us to the nets, we covered the birds to keep them calm while they were extracted. 30 birds in the net which kept us busy for a while. 

All the Curlew were colour ringed as part of a BTO study - so keep an eye out for them, especially when scanning curlew roosts. More importantly don't forget to report them!  





Ooo! Arty. Curlew catchers calm their catch by covering them.
Say that 10 times really quickly.

Once the birds were extracted and safely in the holding "box"
we split into three teams; (back to front) ringing team,
processing team, and colour-ringing team.

Up close and personal with the processing team. AH is
at the back with one of his first curlew; it was a nightmare
trying to get him to let go of it. No Anthony, its not yours.

Even more up close and personal with the colour ringing team.
The ever handsome Denis Jackson on the right is more clearly
seen than the equally handsome Maurice on the left - sorry
for cutting off your head Maurice.

Look out for these blighters - and don't for get to report them!



This is a Curlew



The most recent addition to the "CJ stares at Birds" collection.



Look at AH's smile - we had to wrestle that bird off him.
RJF on the other hand is just thinking about breakfast.

The Weekend

The sessions down the bay on Friday and Saturday between them totaled around the 50 bird mark, with Chiffs making up the majority of the catches.

The steady trickle of birds was at an ideal pace for the trainee's, especially for our newest addition, Anthony Hallam. Anthony, or Thon, has just moved back to Wales having completed an MSc and where he was training to ring. Despite being a veggie and T-total we can vouch that he is actually a ringer.

If the trickle of summer migrants through the bay wasn't reminder enough of the coming winter, then a visit to the stables to count roosting swallows was. Only two birds, 1 adult male and a juv appear to be all that's left of this year's breeders and offspring. Until next year our fork-tailed friends.

Speaking of swallows. We had another bash at a swallow roost on Sunday resulting in a bumper catch of 1 reed bunting, 1 blue tit and 1 sedge warbler. Our waterfowl catching was somewhat hampered by the sheer quantity of bread being fed to the the quackers on what turned out to be a Sunny Sunday.

Chiff, Chiff, Chiff, Ooo Sedwa, Chiff, Chiff, Chiff...

And that is how the morning down the Bay for CJ, Dr O, Padwan Mike, and Facey progressed. Chiff, after chiff, after chiff, with the odd blackcap or sedwa thrown in for good measure.



CJ's face as what seemed like the 1000th Chiffchaff of the morning is processed



One of many - we shouldn't grumble.



We did get some variety, with this little gem being bird of the day...

We've caught several kingfishers this year and one thing we've failed to capture is the mad twisty-wrynecky-woodpeckery-thing they do with their heads. But to day we managed it.



It can be far more extreme than this with their heads doing nearly 360!

We also bagged a little flock of goldfinches. Now we don't like to get too technical but here we go. The picture below shows a male and female of the species; left and right respectively. The female if you look closely has pale nasal bristles where as the male's are black. Its not totally clear in this image, mainly because they are in moult, but the red on the head extends beyond the eye in male but not in the lady finch.  

We apologise for this education break in our usual service.

CJ was left manning the site, while the rest of us headed to work or thesis writing, and it proceeded much the same... ending on 75 birds.

Just an Excuse...

... for another picture. The latest session at the Bay produced, among the usual suspects, 32 Chiffchaffs and this new Cetti's:

Quick update

The weather over the weekend wasn’t exactly conducive to the activity of ringing. Lie-ins were had. Wrynecks were seen. The weather cleared in the evenings and so it was to Cossie we went in search of roosting swallows. And boy were we successful:

Of course that wasn’t our catch at Cosmeston – where the hell do you think we’re based?

We had success by our measures in that, we went out to catch roosting swallows and that is what we caught… 3 in total…and 9 sand martins. That Is Success.

While we were waiting for the nets to err… ahem… fill, we kicked off the waterfowl season, ringing six mallard.

Earlier in the week, we had another bash for chiffies at the stables. They were thin on the ground but it wasn’t all bad.   



Ooo Pretty like



1 for joy, 2 for more joy, three for... you get the picture

A trip to the bay yesterday and 51 more birds in the bag - well several bags, not all at the same time, and they were only in them a short while.

Among the morning's customers was this fella:



No not scruff ginger beard on the right, the one on the left.



Yes, this one.


Magpies aren't the easiest of birds to catch, with this being only the fifth we've caught down the bay.

(And a Lesser Redpoll, CJ Ed.)