Nottinghamshire Day Trip - 18th February 2024

 Yesterday, I had a little drive around a few sites in Nottinghamshire, adding 5 species to the Year List.

I started off, in the rain (!) at Rufford, searching for Hawfinch. Unfortunately, after two hours, I came away empty handed. I did, however, manage to add Jay (119) and Stock Dove (120).

Next up, was Budby South Forest, where I managed to spot Stonechats (121) and singing Woodlarks (122).

From here, I drove on to Clumber Park, spotting the long-staying, feral Red-breasted Goose (in the background of the photo) along with Mute Swan, Y358 (ringed 13km away, in 2019, as an adult. This was my 6th sighting at Clumber), and a green-ringed Black-headed Gull, 263C. This was the first sighting of this bird since it was ringed, at Center Parcs, on 16th December 2023.

Y358

263C

The next stop, was a return visit to Rufford, where there were just 70 Black-headed Gulls, along with 10 Goosander (8 females and 2 males) and lots of geese!! Ringed gulls were: 258A (my 30th sighting since February 2020!), 207C (14th sighting since December 2022), 258C (6th sighting since December 2023), 270C (2nd sighting, since December 2023) and 273C (4th sighting since 6th January 2024). 

The final stop of the day, was Carburton Lake, where I managed to spot a very distant adult Caspian Gull (123). A single Red-legged Partridge (124) was seen on the drive back home.

Linacre Ringing - 24th November 2019

Yesterday I was down at Linacre for a 4 hour ringing session with 3 other members of Sorby Breck Ringing Group. We had a steady morning, with 41 birds of 11 species.

Numbers were as follows (new/retrap): Blue Tit 6/7, Great Tit 7/5, Long-tailed Tit 1/2, Coal Tit 3/1, Redwing 1/0, Blackbird 1/0, Wren 1/1, Bullfinch 2/0, Chaffinch 1/0 and Jay 1/0.

Linacre Ringing - 30th March 2019

This morning I was down at Linacre for the first ringing session since January with 3 other members of Sorby Breck Ringing Group. We got on site at 05:30, and the first bird we caught was a retrap Chiffchaff. On checking, we found that it had been ringed, as a 3 (born that year), at Linacre, in August 2018. Great record!

The rest of the morning was steady, with the following birds caught and ringed (new/retrap): Dunnock 0/1, Robin 0/1, Blackbird 0/1, Chiffchaff 2/1, Goldcrest 1/0, Long-tailed Tit 2/1, Coal Tit 1/0, Blue Tit 4/3 and Jay 0/1.

The retrap  Dunnock was first caught and aged by us, at Linacre, as a 5, in January 2015, meaning it was born in 2014. This was the first time it had been retrapped.

One of the Blue Tit retraps had also been ringed by the group (me in this case), as a pullus, in one of our boxes (c.12) last year on 29th May. This was also, the first retrap of this bird.

Other birds seen during the ringing session were: Tawny Owl (2 seen), Buzzard (1 over), Sparrowhawk (1 over), Kestrel (1 over), Canada Goose (2 flew over), Blackcap (1 heard singing in the ringing site, the first Linacre sighting of 2019) and Raven (2 seen flying over).

Linacre - First visit of 2019

On Wednesday, Luke and I had our first visit of the year to Linacre. We walked around the middle and top reservoirs recording the following waterbirds: Mallard (79), Tufted Duck (11), Mandarin Duck (6), Moorhen (15), Coot (4), Kingfisher (1), Black-headed Gull (76), Little Grebe (1) and Grey Wagtail (2).

We also added another few species to the "year list". Greenfinch was recorded in the garden.

Year List:
31 – Green Woodpecker
32 – Wren
33 – Mandarin Duck
34 – Goldcrest
35 – Wren
36 – Blue Tit
37 – Long-tailed Tit
38 – Nuthatch
39 – Jay
40 – Chaffinch
41 – Little Grebe
42 – Kingfisher
43 – Great-spotted Woodpecker
44 – Grey Wagtail
45 – Dunnock
46 – Greenfinch

Linacre Ringing - an update

I've been out ringing with Sorby Breck Ringing Group a couple of times recently. Both sessions were quite quiet with the following birds ringed:

18th November 2018 13 birds: Wren 1/0, Robin 1/0, Long-tailed Tit 3/1, Coal Tit 1/0, Blue Tit 1/1, Great Tit 4/0.

16th December 2018 25 birds: Dunnock 1/0, Robin 0/1, Blue Tit 1/8, Great Tit 8/5, Jay 1/0.

The highlight was, obviously, today's Jay, a first year bird, and the first ringed at Linacre this year.

Linacre Ringing - 25th November 2017

Last Saturday saw 5 members of the Sorby Breck Ringing Group down at Linacre for a ringing session. The weather was a bit blustery, with a few rain/sleet showers and a temperature of just 4 degrees, so, as you can guess, the ringing was slow. After 3 hours we'd caught just 9 birds of 5 species, namely (new/retrap): Blue Tit (3/1), Great Tit (1/0), Coal Tit (1/0), Goldcrest (2/0) and Dunnock (0/1).

Other birds recorded on the ringing site were: Redwing (20+ over), Fieldfare (12, the first of the winter), Long-tailed Tit, Bullfinch (heard), Chaffinch, Jay (2 seen), Magpie (1), Blackbird, Song Thrush (1 seen) and Kestrel ( 1 hunting over the site).

Whilst there, my nephew, Luke had a quick walk around the bottom and middle reservoirs were he recorded: c.20 Black-headed Gulls, 12 Mandarin Ducks, Mallard, 1 Great-crested Grebe and 2 Cormorants.

Linacre Ringing - 15th October 2017

It wasn't a great morning weather wise today, but we (Sorby Breck Ringing Group) managed to get out to Linacre for a few hours ringing.

It was quiet from the outset, but we still managed to ring 35 birds of 8 species, as follows: Dunnock 2/0, Robin 1/0, Goldcrest 15/1, Long-tailed Tit 1/2, Coal Tit 1/0, Blue Tit 5/1, Great Tit 4/1, Nuthatch 0/1.

Long-tailed Tit

Other birds seen/heard during the morning included Tawny Owl (heard on arrival), Jay, Redwing (c.30 over), Grey Heron (1 heard) and Mistle Thrush (1 over). A flyby Red Admiral butterfly was also seen briefly.

Linacre Ringing and a nice retrap

The weather forecast for this morning was dry and settled, so I was down at Linacre with 3 other members of Sorby Breck Ringing Group, and my nephew, Luke, for a ringing session. Ringing was steady and in the 3 and a half hours on site we caught 22 new birds of 7 species. Birds caught were (new/retrap): Blue Tit (7/0), Great Tit (5/2), Coal Tit (0/1), Goldcrest (1/0), Robin (2/2), Chaffinch (1/0) and Nuthatch (1/0).

Nuthatch

Whilst ringing at Linacre we often retrap birds that we've previously ringed here. As you can see from the totals above, today we re trapped, amongst others, 2 Great Tits, 1 of which was wearing a B ring. As soon as we see a Great Tit wearing a B ring we get excited, because this means the bird was ringed as a pullus, in the nest (adult birds are ringed with an A ring). Anyway, this afternoon I found out that today's bird was ringed at Linacre Reservoirs, by me, in a nestbox just above the top reservoir, at 7.30pm on Thursday 4th June 2015 (thanks for the details David).  It came from a brood of 5 birds, and this sighting is the first since it was ringed. All the birds ringed in this box fledged successfully, but none of the other birds have been re trapped ... yet. See blog post here for details of the ringing trip. Here's a picture of one of today's Great Tits (can't remember if it's the re trapped bird or not!).

Great Tit

In between net rounds we also recorded the following birds: Kestrel (1), Sparrowhawk (1), Jay, Starling (c.20), Magpie (1), Mistle Thrush (1), Bullfinch (heard), Siskin (heard), Long-tailed Tit (heard), Woodpigeon (10s) and the immature Shag (found on the bottom reservoir by Luke- thanks).

Linacre - 28th July 2016

It was quite sunny this morning this morning, so I had  a couple of hours down at Linacre to see if I could catch up with the Shag. It took me about an hour, but I eventually found it on the overflow of the middle reservoir. It was quite confiding, and I managed to get a nice photo showing how its moulting into its adult plumage.

Shag

As well as the Shag, other birds spotted were, a female Sparrowhawk over the top reservoir, 5 Grey Wagtails (1 adult and 4 juveniles), a Kingfisher, 2 Great-crested Grebes, a Jay, 3 Grey Herons, 1 Swift, 30-40 House Martins and a female Tufted Duck with 5 ducklings.

A Common Frog was also spotted.

Common Frog

There were lots of insects about, but I'll save those for another post!!

Avenue Ringing - 7th February 2016

After a few weekends of wet and windy weather, I managed to get out with 4 other members of Sorby Breck Ringing Group for a ringing session at Derbyshire Wildlife Trust's Avenue Washlands reserve in Chesterfield. We managed  nearly 3 hours and caught a very respectable 39 birds of 11 species (Jay, Goldfinch, Greenfinch, Chaffinch, Bullfinch, Yellowhammer, Reed Bunting, Lesser Redpoll, Willow, Blue and Great Tit).

The first bird in the net was a Jay, which I get the "pleasure" of extracting. Over the next few hours we continued to extract and process the birds, with an amazing 17 Bullfinches, being the most numerous species of the day. We also had a couple of Yellowhammers, including an amazingly bright adult male, 4 Reed Buntings and a couple of Lesser Redpolls- nice!

3 of the species we caught today were "year ticks", which took me over the 100 mark for 2016.

Year List update:

99 – Jay

100 – Willow Tit

101 - Yellowhammer

Linacre Ringing - 10th October 2015

I was down at Linacre this morning, for the first time in a few weeks, ringing with 3 other members of Sorby Breck Ringing Group. We started at 7.15am, and in 4 hours, managed to catch and process 34 birds of 8 species (new/retraps); Dunnock 1/1, Goldfinch 5/0, Chaffinch 5/0, Bullfinch 1/0, Goldcrest 7/0, Wren 3/0, Blue Tit 3/3 and Great Tit 4/1.

It was quite quiet around the ringing site, but we did also record Nuthatch (heard), Grey Wagtail (2 flew over), Long-tailed Tit (a small flock flying around), Jay (2 heard) and Kestrel (1 seen flying, being mobbed by the local Carrion Crows and perched up in trees).

Avenue Ringing - 4th January 2015

After a blank month in December, when I didn't manage to get out ringing at all, I was very pleased to get out this morning. There was a hard frost, when we arrived at The Avenue Washlands, but we still managed an excellent start to the year with 122 birds of 14 species ringed (Blue, Great, Willow and Long-tailed Tit, Robin, Bullfinch, Goldfinch, Greenfinch, Chaffinch, Yellowhammer, Reed Bunting, Goldcrest, Jay and Wren).

My personal totals were (new/retrap): Long-tailed Tit 3/1, Blue Tit 3/2, Great Tit 1/2, Willow Tit 0/1, Chaffinch 1/0,Greenfinch 1/0, Bullfinch 1/2, Reed Bunting 1/0, Yellowhammer 1/0, Jay 1/0, Goldfinch 3/0, Goldcrest 0/1, Robin 0/1 and Wren 0/1.

We could have carried on ringing all day, as the birds were still coming thick and fast when we decided to pack up. Instead, we thought it best to give the birds some uninterrupted time to feed up on the feeders.

One of the Blue Tits we caught today was a "control", i.e. a bird that is caught away from the site it was originally ringed. Today's bird was one that had been originally ringed by our group 24km away at Blackburn Meadows in Sheffield in November 2014.

As well as the ringing, I also got a few "year ticks", bringing the total to 53 species so far:

46 - Greenfinch (garden)

47 – Sparrowhawk (over bypass)
48 – House Sparrow (garden)
49 – Reed Bunting
50 – Yellowhammer
51 – Willow Tit
52 – Green Woodpecker
53 - Jay

Record Black-headed Gulls and first Goosander

I was looking at the Sheffield Bird Study Group website last night, when I noticed a record of 240 Black-headed Gulls and 2 Goosanders at Linacre on Friday. Both records were noteworthy, as the gull's record is the highest ever count for this site as far as I am aware, and the Goosander record is the first of this winter period.

With these records fresh in my mind, I decided to go down to Linacre this morning to see what was about. I took a loaf of bread with me, and managed to attract a respectable 132 Black-headed Gulls down, which was my best count of the year (so far). I managed to entice a few of these birds onto the wall, so I could scan their legs for colour rings, but, as you can see, all the legs were bare!

Black-headed Gulls

Whilst walking around I also managed to spot 2 male Goosanders on the middle reservoir, along with 126 Mallards (my highest count since January), 10 Tufted Ducks, 9 Moorhens and 3 Coots. Unfortunately, despite a lot of searching, I didn't manage to find any Mandarin Ducks at all!

 

The sun came out every now and then during my walk, and I managed to grab a photograph of this Treecreeper. Not an easy species to spot, never mind photograph, I was really pleased to get these shots.

 

Treecreeper

 

Other species seen in the woodland included Jay, Crow, Magpie, Blackbird, Robin, Wren, Great-spotted Woodpecker along with Blue, Great, Long-tailed and Coal Tit.

House Sparrow ringing- new for the year

House Sparrow is a species  that I don't ring very often (my last was in August 2013), so I was very pleased when one turned up in the nets whilst out ringing with The Group this morning at our private garden site in Sheffield.

House Sparrow

 

The bird in question was a bird born this year, which was going through it's "post juvenile moult". In the picture below, you can see that it has dropped all its greater coverts. These will regrow over the next week or so, and will become indistinguishable from an adult bird.

House Sparrow in moult

 

In addition to the House Sparrow, we also ringed a couple of Blackbirds, a Treecreeper, Great and Blue Tits, 2 Goldcrests, along with several Dunnocks and Robins.

 

There were a few other species around the site, including a singing Chiffchaff, 4 Mistle Thrushes, 4 Swallows and several Jays.



Another very busy session

The last time I went out ringing (see here), we managed to ring over 100 birds. Well, Saturday saw us (Sorby Breck Ringing Group), down at Linacre for a ringing demo, which was just as busy and saw us ring a total of 108 birds of 16 different species (Blue, Great, Coal Tit, Jay, Blackbird, Willow Warbler, Chiffchaff, Blackcap, Garden Warbler, Bullfinch, Chaffinch, Goldfinch, Wren, Nuthatch, Dunnock and Robin).

We set the nets at 5.30am, and the first net round produced 34 birds. Every net round brought in a similar number, and included our first Garden Warbler of the year, our first juvenile Willow Warblers and Chiffchaffs and excellent counts of 20 Blackcaps, and 16 Blackbirds.

Out of the total of 108 birds ringed,101 were 3Js, or birds born this year, which again shows what a good season it's been. Especially nice to see was a Great Tit, that had been ringed in one of the boxes on site earlier this year.

My personal totals were (new/retrap):

Blackbird 4/0, Willow Warbler 2/0, Blackcap 6/0, Jay 0/1, Nuthatch 2/0, Great Tit 4/0, Bullfinch 1/0, Chiffchaff 1/0, Dunnock 2/0, Robin 2/0, Blue Tit 2/1, Chaffinch 1/0.

During the very few breaks we got, a few other birds were noted, including a migrating flock of about 50 House Martins that passed through to the East, 2 Swifts, and a flock of 7 Canada Geese that also flew over the site.

Avenue Ringing - 16th February 2014

Yesterday morning the weather was dry and still, so I managed to get out ringing with the Sorby Breck Group. We went back down to the Derbyshire Wildlife Trust's  Avenue Washlands in Chesterfield. We had a very productive few hours with 42 birds of 12 species ringed (Jay, Song Thrush, Goldfinch, Bullfinch, Greenfinch, Reed Bunting, Yellowhammer, Dunnock, Blue, Great, Willow and Long-tailed Tit).

My totals were (new/retraps):
Song Thrush 1/0, Great Tit 0/3, Blue Tit 2/0, Dunnock 0/2, Reed Bunting 0/1, Yellowhammer 1/0.

In between net rounds we did some birding and the highlight for me was a "year tick"; Meadow Pipit. A flock of 12 appeared and perched on the fence. Grey Partridge were heard again.

Year List:
94- Meadow Pipit

First Kingfisher Sighting of the Year

The wind was blowing quite hard again this morning, so unfortunately no ringing today. Instead I popped down to Linacre to pick up some new nestboxes that I'll be putting up in a few weeks time, and had a couple of hours walking around all 3 reservoirs.

Despite the windy conditions I did manage to record a few woodland birds, including a few singing Blue, Coal and Great Tits, along with the Crossbills (heard, but not seen), a Great-spotted Woodpecker and a Jay.

Out on the water the Tufted Duck numbers were up to 70, which is the highest ever count. Also present were 73 Mallards, 6 Goosanders (4 redheads and 2 males), 1 Grey Heron, 12 Black-headed Gulls, 7 Moorhens, 12 Coots, 2 Little Grebes and a Kingfisher (year tick). The Kingfisher was first seen perched in the trees on the south side of the middle reservoir at around 9.30am, and then when I was walking by the bottom reservoir at about 11,15am I saw it or another fly the length of the water and disappear into the woods to the East of the site. A lovely site and a very nice addition to the "Year List". Interestingly there wasn't a single Mandarin Duck  on site at all today. Where were they??

As well as being my 83rd species of the year it was also the 40th species for Linacre this year.

Year List update:

83 - Kingfisher

Welcome to 2014

I woke up at about 7am this morning to the sound of an alarm-calling Blackbird - my first bird of 2014! As I was awake I decided to get up and head out to Linacre for a few hours before it started to rain.

I got to Linacre just before sunrise  and the first birds I saw were two Little Owls that flew into the oak tree where we ringed an adult and young bird last year ( see here and here for details and pictures). Hopefully, these two were the adult birds from last year, and they'll breed again in 2014. I carried on down the main drive and the second bird I saw was a Tawny Owl that flew across from the middle car park into the woods. Not a bad start! When I got out of the car I could also hear several "Tawnies" calling in the woods.

I walked around all 3 reservoirs over the next 2 hours, and, despite the rain that started after an hour, I managed to record some excellent counts of Mallard (170 - a new highest count), Mandarin Duck (34), Tufted Duck (64),  Black-headed Gull (57), Coot (15- highest January count), Moorhen (8), Cormorant (2), Little Grebe (2) and Canada Goose (2 on the middle reservoir- my first January record).

Year List update:
1 – Blackbird
2 – Little Owl
3- Tawny Owl
4 – Carrion Crow
5 – Pheasant
6 – Robin
7 – Wren
8 – Redwing
9 – Woodpigeon
10 – Goldcrest
11 – Siskin
12 - Bullfinch
13 – Nuthatch
14 – Jay
15 – Chaffinch
16 – Blue Tit
17 – Great Tit
18 – Coal Tit
19 – Tufted Duck
20 – Mallard
21 – Long-tailed Tit
22 – Great-spotted Woodpecker
23 – Coot
24 – Moorhen
25 – Treecreeper
26 – Jackdaw
27 – Black-headed Gull
28 – Little Grebe
29 – Canada Goose
30 – Mandarin Duck
31 – Cormorant
32 – Magpie
33 – Dunnock
34 – Greenfinch
35 - Starling

Birds 2 - 31 were all seen at Linacre and 1 and 32 - 35 were seen in the garden at home.

Year List Update

I've just been going through my Year List notes, and I noticed that there were a few species missing. As a result, my Year List has just increased by 8 species!! Here they are:

187 – Great Black-backed Gull

188 – Grey Heron
189 – Knot
190 – Curlew
191 – Jay
192 – Jackdaw
193 - Canada Goose
194 - Raven

The 200 mark looks achievable!!!!

Ringing again!

Following hot on the heels of Saturday's ringing session at Linacre I was out again this morning with 4 other members of the Sorby Breck Ringing Group at the private site in Wingerworth, Chesterfield. Three and a half hours passed by very quickly as we caught and ringed/processed a total of 56 birds, including 2 Great-spotted Woodpeckers, such as this juvenile bird (note the red feathers on the head). A pair bred on the site this year, so perhaps this was one of the youngsters?

Great-spotted Woodpecker

As well as the woodpeckers we also ringed a wide range of woodland species such as Blue, Great and Coal Tit, Nuthatch, Blackbird, Robin, Dunnock and Chaffinch.

Nuthatch

Juvenile Blue Tit (growing new blue feathers)

 

A common bird at all our ringing sites is the Dunnock (Prunella modularis). Below are a couple of photos from this morning showing one way to age this species. The top picture, an adult bird, shows a very bright, contrasting eye colour. The second picture shows a bird born this year, (3J) and hopefully you can see that the eye is overall much darker with very little contrast. Honestly!!

Adult Dunnock

 

Juvenile Dunnock

 

There were a few other birds flying around the site this morning including Jay, Common Buzzard and at least 2 Swifts.

 

After we'd finished I popped back up to Wragg's Quarry to look for some dragonflies. I'll blog about that tomorrow, but suffice to say I got a "lifer" and some nice new photos!