Polish Dunlin in Northumberland

A couple of weeks ago I had a trip up to St Mary's Island, Northumberland. Whilst here I spotted a colour ringed Dunlin. I sent the details off to the BTO and recently received an email from Poland saying that the bird had been ringed there on 8th August 2010, presumably passing through on migration from its breeding grounds in the Arctic. Here's a picture of the bird in question.

Colour ringed Dunlin with Purple Sandpipers

When ringed it was aged as a 2 year old bird. There have been two sightings since it was ringed, both at St Mary's during the winter time. The first was on 1st January 2011 and then my sighting on 19th February 2012, which seems to show that this bird remains faithful to this wintering site. Now we just need to get a sighting during the summer months to see exactly where it breeds.

The fact that it has been colour ringed means that a lot of information can be gathered about this bird even without it being recaptured. For more information about a range of colour ringing projects in Europe see here.