Pennington Flash - 12th January 2025

 Jayne had an appointment in Stockport on Sunday, so, after dropping her off, I drove across to Pennington Flash. The main lake was 95% frozen over, with 100s of birds close to the car park. With so much ice, I was able to find darvic-ringed Mute Swans, Coot, Black-headed and a Lesser Black-backed Gull, as well as 4 " Year Ticks".

The first ringed birds I saw, were all Black-headed Gulls. In total, I saw 9 different birds; 7 British-ringed birds (2T90, 2S94, 213A, 234B, 268C, 269C and 284C), and 2 Norwegian-ringed birds (J2714, ringed near Oslo, as an adult, in May 2024 and J3260, ringed, as a pullus, near Oslo, in June 2023). 

J2714

J3260

The British birds had all been ringed at Pennington, between 2019 and 2022. None had been sighted abroad, except 213A, which was seen in The Netherlands in April 2024 (a possible breeding site?).

The Lesser Black-backed Gull, A70:W, was also seen on the ice. A record have been sent off, and I'll update, when I get the ringing details back.

Lesser Black-backed Gull A70:W

The 9 Mute Swans were all out on the side of the lake, enjoying the food being given out. The ringed birds were: CPT2 (green/W48751, 40ST (blue)/XY46_ _ _, 4FAU (blue), BY6 (blue)/ZY6998, 4BYN (blue)/XY2448, XY5830 (no darvic), XY4465 (no darvic), 4HFI (blue, age 5)/W43982 and 4HDN (blue, age 5).

The final bird, a Coot, with darvic ring J7F, was also out, feeding on the side of the lake. This bird was ringed, as an adult, at Pennington, in December 2020. My sighting was just the 4th since ringing.

Coot

All the Black-headed Gulls and the Coot had been ringed by the Waterbird Colour Marking Group.

After recording all the ringed birds, I had a walk around the reserve. It was very cold, and all the water was frozen. Despite this, I managed to find the following year ticks: Great White Egret (108), Bullfinch (109), Willow Tit (110) and Coal Tit (111).

Great White (and Little) Egret

Musselburgh Lagoons- 4th January 2024

 Whilst up in Northumberland, we had a day in Edinburgh. As always, we stopped off at Musselburgh Lagoons for an hour.

The first bird I heard was a Willow Tit (83). I then walked down to the seawall, where I spotted an adult Great Northern Diver (84), a couple of Slavonian Grebes (85), flyby Velvet Scoter (86), Eider Ducks, several Long-tailed Ducks, Shags and fly-by Black-headed and Common Gulls.

Slavonian Grebe

Walking to the lagoons, I spotted Wigeon, Teal, Lapwing, Redshank, Oystercatcher and a single male Long-tailed Duck.

Long-tailed Duck

Red-necked Grebe - Carsington 2nd April 2021

Jayne and I went to Carsington on Friday and had a few hours walking around the dam wall, Stones Island and Hide area.

The highlight of the trip was a breeding plumaged Red-necked Grebe that we saw by the dam wall. No photo unfortunately, as the blog won't let me upload any!

Other  species new for the year were: Gadwall, Redshank, Willow Tit and Barnacle Goose ( 2 feral birds.

Year List update:

72 - Red-necked Grebe

73 - Gadwall

74 - Redshank

75 - Willow Tit

76 - Barnacle Goose

Scarborough Birding - 22nd February 2019

I spent yesterday in Scarborough with Jayne and Lydia. Whilst there, I had my annual visit to Holbeck Car Park to see the over-wintering Mediterranean Gulls. As always, they put on a great show, with at least  4 different birds being seen, including this adult bird whose black hood was developing very nicely.

Mediterranean Gull

Black-headed Gulls also came down, as did a darvic ringed Herring Gull (more about that in another post).

Our next stop was Marine Drive and the harbour, where we saw our first Fulmars of the year (approx.20 birds back on the cliffs),  1 Rock Pipit, 1 Shag, 15+ Turnstones, including 5 colour-ringed individuals (another post coming), another darviced Herring Gull, and 4 Purple Sandpipers.

Year List update:
112 – Fieldfare (seen on 3rd Feb)
113 – Willow Tit (seen ringing 17th Feb)
114 – Mediterranean Gull
115 – Shag
116 – Fulmar
117 – Rock Pipit

118 – Purple Sandpiper

Year List Update - 21st January 2018

It's been a while since I updated the Year List, and it's moved on quite a bit, so here goes. Numbers 47 to 50 were seen at Derbyshire Wildlife's Avenue Washlands reserve during a ringing session. Numbers 52 to 55 were seen during a walk around The Yorkshire Sculpture Park. Numbers 56 and 57 were recorded in my garden, whilst numbers 58 to 67 were seen last weekend at Carsington Water. The Goldcrest was seen yesterday during the ringing session at Linacre, and the Tawny Owl was heard in the early hours of this morning from my bed!!

47 – Little Owl

48 – Reed Bunting
49 – Yellowhammer
50 – Mistle Thrush
51 – Kingfisher
52 – Pochard
53 – Shoveler
54 – Canada Goose
55 – Teal
56 – Sparrowhawk
57 – Siskin
58 – Gadwall
59 – Wigeon
60 – Common Gull
61 – Great Northern Diver
62 - Pheasant
63 - Willow Tit
64 – Lapwing
65 – Snipe
66 – Fieldfare
67 – Treecreeper
68 - Goldcrest
69 – Tawny Owl

French-ringed Reed Warbler

Yesterday I was out for my first ringing session in a while at Poolsbrook Marsh, with 5 other members of Sorby Breck Ringing Group.

We arrived on site at 5.00am, got the nets out and started to catch some birds. By the end of the morning's session we had caught 73 birds of 15 species. Totals were (new/retrap): Wren 2/0, Dunnock 2/0, Robin 1/0, Blackbird 1/0, Sedge Warbler 1/0, Reed Warbler 33/2, Lesser Whitethroat 2/0, Whitethroat 3/0, Blackcap 6/0, Chiffchaff 2/0, Willow Warbler 5/1, Willow Tit 4/0, Blue Tit 0/1, Bullfinch 4/0 and Reed Bunting 3/0.

As you can see, we had a good range of resident and migrant species, including 7 species of warbler. The vast majority of birds were new (and juveniles), but we did have a few previously ringed birds, including a very special Reed Warbler bearing a "Museum Paris" ring!! As the name implies, this bird, which we aged as an adult, had been ringed in France. It'd be great to think that it is a bird that was born at Poolsbrook, and was then ringed on migration through France, before returning the breed here in Derbyshire. I'll update the blog when we get the details back from the BTO.

Other birds seen today included Kingfisher, Common Buzzard and Water Rail (heard only).

New Year Ringing, Waxwings and Year Ticks

I know its not quite the new year now, but today was the first opportunity I had to get out ringing in 2017, hence the title of today's post.

This morning I was out with 4 other members of the Sorby Breck Ringing Group visiting the Derbyshire Wildlife Trust's Avenue Washlands Reserve in Chesterfield. We had a 3 and a half hour session, catching a super 104 birds of 15 species. Birds caught were (new/retrap): Wren 1/0, Dunnock 1/0, Robin 3/0, Blackbird 1/0, Goldcrest 1/1, Long-tailed Tit 1/7, Willow Tit 1/0, Blue Tit 8/6, Great Tit 4/9, Chaffinch 4/4, Greenfinch 3/0, Goldfinch 36/1, Bullfinch 9/2, Yellowhammer 1/1 and Reed Bunting 3/0.

As you can see, we had  a very good selection of bird species today. The most notable were the excellent number of Goldfinch, followed closely by the new Willow Tit ( a species which seems to be declining quite quickly), the Reed Bunting, Yellowhammer and Bullfinch (all "year ticks" as well).

After ringing Jayne and I had a drive to Chesterfield to see a group of 18 Waxwings on Whittington Moor. We then had a drive out to Bakewell, where we had a spot of lunch and a walk by the river, adding Canada Goose to the "year list". Whilst here, we also spotted the Tufted Duck x Pochard hybrid duck, that is back on the river for the winter. Details of this bird can be found here.

Hybrid Duck

Year List update:
47 – Canada Goose
48 – Willow Tit
49 – Bullfinch
50 – Yellowhammer
51 – Reed Bunting

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

Carsington Water Year Tick

I was out at Carsington Water yesterday with Jayne, with the hope of adding another species to the "year list". As you can probably guess from the title of this post I got lucky, spotting one of the three Great Northern Divers that were present on the reservoir. No photo though, as it was too far out.

Whilst there, we also had a walk down to the bird hide where we spotted several Tree Sparrows on the feeders along with Chaffinches and a single Willow Tit.

Tree Sparrow

Willow Tit

Year List update:

179: Great Northern Diver

Ringing tick

This weekend's ringing session took place at the Derbyshire Wildlife Trust's Avenue Washlands. There were just 3 of us from The Group, but we still managed to ring 63 birds of 11 different species, including a "ringing tick" for me; a Mistle Thrush.

Mistle Thrush

 

Other species ringed were: Bullfinch, Chaffinch, Goldfinch, Greenfinch, Reed Bunting, Yellowhammer, Blue, Great, Willow and Long-tailed Tit.

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

Avenue Ringing - Finches galore!

The weather for the last few weekends has been grey, overcast and wet, so when we saw a half decent forecast for this morning we (Sorby Breck Ringing Group) decided to get out and do some ringing - hurrah!

3 of us managed to get out to Derbyshire Wildlife Trust's Avenue Washlands in Chesterfield, where we ringed 49 birds of 11 species (Blackbird, Goldfinch, Chaffinch, Bullfinch, Greenfinch, Yellowhammer, Dunnock, Robin, Blue, Great and Willow Tit) in three and a half hours.

As the title suggests, many of the birds were finches, and I was lucky enough to ring 3 new Bullfinches (and process 1 retrap), a retrap Greenfinch, 2 new Goldfinches, and 1 retrapped Chaffinch. Along with these birds I also had the following birds new/retrap: Blue Tit 2/3, Great Tit 4/6, Robin 2/0 and Willow Tit 0/1.

In between net rounds, as always, we kept our eyes open for other wildlife. Today we managed to record several Fieldfare, lots of Blackbirds, Skylark, a Kestrel, and, best of all, an over-flying flock of approx. 45 Pink-footed Geese.

Avenue Ringing x 2

As the title of today's post suggests, I've had two ringing sessions at The Avenue this week. The first, on Sunday, was an early morning session, whilst the second, on Tuesday, was an evening visit for a last attempt at the Swallow roost.

Sunday's session was a slow, but steady, with a total of 46 birds of 10 different species ringed (Willow, Great and Blue Tit, Chaffinch, Bullfinch, Goldfinch, Robin, Dunnock, Blackcap and Chiffchaff). My personal total were (new/retrap): Willow Tit 0/1, Blue Tit 0/1, Great Tit 2/4, Chaffinch 1/0, Bullfinch 1/2 and Dunnock 1/1.

Tuesday's session was out second attempt of the year to catch Swallows that roost at The Avenue before migrating to Africa for the winter months (see here for details of our first outing). . There were only about 50/60 birds roosting, so we were very lucky to catch 23, as well as a single juvenile Sand Martin. Again, my personal total was 8 Swallows, all new birds. A change from the first visit was the fact that we caught 4 adult birds this time.

Unfortunately, this will most likely be our last attempt to catch the Swallows this year. We can now begin to look forward to the Meadow Pipit migration up on the moors, and the first winter visitors... a Redwing or Fieldfare would be nice!!!

A very busy session!

Sunday's ringing session with the group, in Wingerworth, Chesterfield started nice and early, at 5.00 am, was my busiest ever with an amazing 117 birds caught and processed in just 4 hours. Out of the 117, 102 were juvenile birds, which shows just how productive the season's been this year.

10 species of bird were caught ( Blackbird, Chaffinch, Bullfinch, Robin, Dunnock, Great-spotted Woodpecker, Blue, Great, Coal and Willow Tit). The Woodpecker was a retrap, a juvenile bird that had been caught at this site earlier in the year.

My totals were (new/retrap):

Blue Tit 13/2, Great Tit 11/1, Coal Tit 2/0, Great-spotted Woodpecker 0/1, Bullfinch 1/0, Dunnock 1/0, Robin 1/0, Blackbird 1/0.

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

Playing catch up

The weather last weekend was pretty awful, but I did manage to get out for one ringing session with the Group. We went down to The Avenue in Chesterfield, where, after a quiet start, we managed a respectable 32 birds of 10 species (Yellowhammer, Reed Bunting, Greenfinch, Bullfinch, Chaffinch, Robin, Blue, Great, Willow and Long-tailed Tit).

My personal totals were (new/retrap):

Willow Tit 0/3, Great Tit 0/1, Yellowhammer 0/1, Chaffinch 1/0, Long-tailed Tit 0/1.

Yellowhammer

Avenue Ringing - 5th January 2014

After a four week break from ringing due to bad weather and Christmas I got out this morning with the group, visiting the Derbyshire Wildlife Trust's Avenue Washlands reserve near Chesterfield. This is one of our regular sites and today's visit will be the first of many this year I'm sure.

We arrived at 7.45am and during the next three and a half hours we caught and processed 61 birds. The first net round produced a small flock of Long-tailed Tits, most of which had already been ringed by us on previous visits. It's always good to retrap ringed birds, as this helps us learn more about their movements and longevity. Here's a picture of my first bird of 2014- a Long-tailed Tit.

Long-tailed Tit

Throughout the morning we carried on catching a good number of birds of many different species; Blue, Great and Willow Tit, Dunnock, Reed Bunting, Yellowhammer, Chaffinch, Bullfinch and this beautiful male Greenfinch (1 of 5 birds).

Male Greenfinch

 

During net rounds we also like to do a bit of birding. Black-headed Gulls were flying over most of the morning along with a Jay, several Blackbirds and Robins. Sighting of the day, however was the small covey of 8/9 Grey Partridges that flew up from the site- a very good "year tick"

 

Year List update:

72 – Willow Tit

73 – Grey Partridge

74 – Reed Bunting

75 – Yellowhammer

Weekend Ringing

I managed to get out ringing twice this weekend with the guys from Sorby Breck; Saturday we were at Linacre and today we spent four hours at the Derbyshire Wildlife Trust's Avenue Washlands reserve.

Saturday's session at Linacre started off very well with a flock of approximately 25 Crossbills flying around the site. Unfortunately, we couldn't entice any of them into the nets, but we did manage to catch an impressive 50 birds of 8 species, including 22 Great Tits and several Goldfinch. Here are a couple of pictures showing a male and a female Goldfinch.

Male bird with red extending behind the eye and black nasal hairs above the beak



Female bird with less extensive red and paler nasal hairs

 

Have a look at this link to see lots more Goldfinch photos from a ringer in the North West, who has ringed over 300 different birds in his garden this winter!!

 

Other birds seen during the session included 45 Pink-footed Geese flying over, a couple of Cormorants and a female Sparrowhawk that we disturbed from its breakfast.

 

1 less Woodpigeon at Linacre!

 

This morning's session at The Avenue was also pretty productive, with 47 birds ringed.  The Trust have created a "Living Bird Table" at the reserve by planting an area with crops such as Sunflowers and Kale. The plants are left to go to seed and the seed is then left for the birds to eat. We set up some nets an the edge of the field and managed to catch about a dozen Reed Buntings and Goldfinches. Linnets and Yellowhammers have also been feeding here, so hopefully we'll be able to catch these too during the winter. Other notable catches this morning were 2 Willow Tits and a retrap Great-spotted Woodpecker, along with the usual Robins, Dunnocks, Chaffinches, Blue and  Great Tits.

Soggy Linacre

Rain and wind put an end to any ringing again this week, so I braved the weather and had a few hours around Linacre. There wasn't too much happening, but waterbirds were present in good numbers and I heard a Willow Tit calling, which was my first here since the summer.

On the reservoirs there were 58 Tufted Ducks, which I'm sure is my highest ever count here, 92 Mallards (again a very good count) just 18 Mandarins, 2 Cormorants, 1 Grey Heron, 7 Coots, 8 Moorhens (7 adults and 1 brown juvenile), 1 Great-crested Grebe, 2 Little Grebes (1 adult and 1 juvenile), 1 Kingfisher (on the middle reservoir again), 4 Black-headed Gulls, 1 Pied Wagtail that flew over, and 1 Grey Wagtail.  Unfortunately, there was no sign of the female Wigeon today, nor the 2 Gadwall that were reported earlier in the week.

The Crossbills were still present around the middle reservoir, along with the Willow Tit and Skylark and Redwings that were heard flying over again.

A moth was disturbed from the ground around the middle reservoir, which I think was a carpet species. I couldn't find it again though, so it'll have to go down as a possible.

Lots of lovely fungi around today, including this bracket fungi.

Bracket fungi

Warblers!

Yesterday I managed to get out ringing with the group, to Carr Vale, the Derbyshire Wildlife Trust's reserve near Bolsover. We arrived at 06.00am and in 4 and a half hours we'd managed to ring 65 birds of 13 species.

As you can tell from the title of today's post, warblers were the key birds, with 41 of the 65 birds caught being warblers. Blackcap were particularly numerous with 17 new birds ringed, followed closely by 10 Chiffchaffs, 2 Reed Warblers and 1 Whitethroat. The bird below was one of the Blackcaps. This bird is a 3, meaning it was born this year, and you can just see a few of the brown juvenile feathers remaining.

Moulting Blackcap

 

As well as the warblers we also caught 4 species of tit (Blue, Great, Long-tailed and Willow). Included in the 12 Long-tailed Tits were two birds that were already ringed. We haven't caught any Lottis before, so it will be interesting to see where these birds were ringed.

 

Other birds ringed on site were (new/retraps): Dunnock 2/1, Bullfinch 1/0, Robin 3/0, Chaffinch 1/0 and Wren 1/0.