New Ringing Site

After a week of cold, windy weather, and a distinct lack of ringing activity, I managed to get out for a few hours with Ray and Alan from Sorby Breck this morning, to have a first session at a new site in Coal Aston. The site is a small, family-run farm with cattle, and the family have set up two feeding stations in the garden area, where we set the nets. The site looks very good for Swallows, so hopefully we'll be able to ring some this summer. We've also put up 5 tit boxes, which I'll check later this month.

The weather for today's session wasn't the best, as it was quite windy, but we still managed to put up 3 nets, and, in just over 3 hours, we caught 17 birds of 6 species (House Sparrow, Nuthatch, Chaffinch, Blue, Great and Long-tailed Tit), which is a pretty good start. Here's a picture of the first bird caught and ringed at this site; a female House Sparrow.

House Sparrow

As the year progresses we should extend this list as new species arrive, and we catch some of the other resident species.

Other birds seen around the site today were; Song Thrush (1 singing bird), Redwing (1 over), Robin (singing birds), Wren (singing birds), Pied Wagtail (a pair of birds, possible breeders?), Great-spotted Woodpecker (heard drumming) and Carrion Crow.