Rufford Gulls

A short, hour long trip to Rufford CP, yesterday saw me catch up with 2 familiar Black-headed Gulls. The first, EUM3 (Dutch ringed), is almost guaranteed on every visit now, and it was in the same place, enjoying some delicious bread again!

EUM3

The second gull, P519 ringed in Lithuania on 1st April 2010 as an adult 1456km away, was first seen by me in February 2019 at Rufford (see here). It had been seen before, at Rufford, in January 2018 and in November 2018, so it's obviously a regular bird here. Yesterday's sighting was the first since February 2019, and hopefully it's back for the winter again.

P519

Linacre WeBS - 27th October 2019

Ringing at Linacre was cancelled this morning dur to strong winds, so instead, Sarah, Robin and I walked around all three reservoirs and carried out this month's WeBS count.

No real surprises this month, but the Mandarin Ducks (48) looked very smart in their newly moulted breeding finery. Also, it was nice to see my first Linacre Black-headed Gulls of the winter, with 24 seen (no rings though).

Other birds seen were: Mallard (87), Tufted Duck (22), Coot (5), Moorhen (13), Grey Heron (1), Grey Wagtail (1), Cormorant (1), Great-crested Grebe (1) and Little Grebe (1).

Look who's back!

I was in Bakewell this afternoon, checking the gulls, when I spotted a familiar bird  - EY19562 (see here).

EY19562

This adult Black-headed Gull was first spotted here in November 2018, and then recorded another 3 times last winter. It had originally been ringed 40km away at Westport Lakes, Staffordshire, as a first year bird, on 10th December  2014, making it 5 years old. Hopefully, it'll hang around the area for another winter.

Linacre Ringing - 12th October 2019

After a couple of wet and windy weekends it was really nice to get out to Linacre again for a ringing session yesterday. I was there with 5 other members of Sorby Breck Ringing Group, and we managed to catch a ring 75 birds of 11 species.

As usual, the majority of birds ringed were tits, with 24 Blue (23 new and 1 retrap), 24 Great Tits (22 new and 2 retraps), 1 Coal Tit (new bird) and 8 Long-tailed Tits (7 new and 1 retrap). We did however, also ring Goldcrest ( 7 new birds), 1 Wren (new), 2 Robins (new), 1 Treecreeper (new), 1 Chiffchaff ( a new, 1st year bird), Blackbird (4 new birds, including 2 probable continental birds) and 2 Redwings (our first of the year).

Chiffchaff

Treecreeper

In between net rounds we also recorded a Peregrine Falcon (only my third Linacre record, and my first since 2016), Raven (1 over), 1 Cormorant and a lovely skein of approximately 180 Pink-footed Geese flying SE. A Red Admiral butterfly was also seen briefly.