Sunday 26th
Although the morning started calm and frosty gales were forecast and started building up by mid-morning. We seized the chance of the quiet bit of the day to ring a few birds. Seventeen were caught of which four were new. The most interesting was a new Robin which weighed 24.4g. 20g is normally a good weight for our Robins. Interestingly its fat score was 5 which is higher than the usual score of 1 or 2.
Saturday 25th
Activity remains low not helped by the weather. We have received some interesting notifications of movements. The first two relate to Redpolls. A bird ringed here as a Lesser was caught 403 days later, 284km SE, on 30/11/24 at Cannock Chase. The second was much more interesting. We rang it on October 10th, 2020, and it was recaught, 1,473 days later and 1811km NE, at Vasterbotten in Sweden. There have been three other birds from the UK recorded in Sweden.
The other group involves Black-headed Gulls. One ringed at Kingsdown was caught 4,557 days later at Sint Jan-in-Eremo, Belgium. The others show the value of checking birds closely. One colour ring read on New Downs, on 19/9/24, had been ringed at Pitsea on 3/12/16. The other was ringed as an adult at Herne Bay on 30/1/12 and was read again there on 16/12/24. It is at least 16 years old but has a way to go before beating the national record of 33 years.
We used to ring gulls regularly when we could and it is worth watching out for them at places such as Herne Bay or Deal.
Tuesday 21st
There are not many suitable days at present and so a forecast of no wind or rain tempted a couple of us out. We were welcomed by a frosty morning which started fogging up before thawing. Of eleven birds three were new - a Chaffinch, a Robin and a Redwing. The best bird however was already ringed. We retrapped a Kestrel we had ringed in the nest in 2021. It was now a very smart male with attractive grey head and rump as shown in the image below. The shape of the black marks on the flanks was also very clearly defined.
Friday 17th
The mild spell appears to have brought a few more birds back into the area. It was not quite as calm as forecast at first and it was overcast. We caught forty birds of which fifteen were new. Long-tailed Tit was most numerous with four new and eight retraps (varying from last autumn birds to ones from two years ago). There were three new Chaffinches and four retraps. Two of the retraps were from six years ago and another was of a large male with a wing of 94mm (the local birds rarely go above 92mm). The other new birds were two each of Blackbird, Blue Tit and Goldfinch, plus single Fieldfare and House Sparrow.
Friday 10th
No ringing but we made use of the calm, if cold, conditions to start re-securing the Kestrel box, which had shifted in the recent gales, and to trim some of the bushes.
Wednesday 8th
Clear, cold and frosty. We had a short session this morning this was to ensure the birds had time to feed. Despite the feeders there was not a lot of activity. Three birds were ringed -Blackbird, Dunnock and House Sparrow. There were eight retraps - two each of Blackbird, Long-tailed Tit and Redwing, plus a House Sparrow and a Robin. The standard checks showed them all to be in reasonable condition.
Saturday 4th
Clear and frosty to start with cloud building by mid-morning. The ringing area was quiet and six birds were ringed. These were four House Sparrows (plus two retraps), a Robin and a Blackbird. We expected more activity around the feeders but they remained quiet.
The Robin had clearly been looking at the weather forecast as it was the fattest one I have seen and had a score of four (maximum would be eight). The Blackbird was a northern Europe size female with a wing of 135mm.