Chaffinch and Reed Warbler controls

After ringing almost 400 Chaffinches at Out Rawcliffe this autumn Will and I might have expected some return from our efforts. However today we received a couple of interesting Chaffinch controls from the BTO, both of them birds ringed not at Out Rawcliffe, but in Will’s Garstang garden. By definition the phrase “garden ringing” may conjure up thoughts of catching species that don’t move far or migrate at all, but Will’s garden at the foot of the Pennines in a well wooded location is well placed to catch migrant birds.

In Will’s garden during 2101 we ringed 183 Chaffinch, with another 133 so far in 2011, years to which the two recoveries below relate. The first Chaffinch L300882, a first year female was caught and ringed on 30 December 2010 and then recaptured the following autumn on 11 October 2011 at Calf of Man Bird Observatory.

The second Chaffinch, Y279256 another first year female was ringed on 4 September 2011 and then recaptured just 49 days later, again on Calf of Man.

Y279256 shows a classic on-going westerly autumn movement to Ireland of a juvenile female Chaffinch. L300882 is slightly more complicated by the recapture in a subsequent year, but it is highly likely the bird made the journey to ireland in both years, the Isle of Man a convenient stopover.

Will’s garden to Calf of Man
Female Chaffinch

In addition to the Chaffinches we received a recovery from Rawcliffe Moss, that of a Reed Warbler, a scarce enough species out on the moss where records always relate to juvenile dispersal or migration. In this case, L141538 a juvenile we ringed on 28 July 2010 was recaptured as a breeding male on 3 July 2011 at Mere Sands Wood, Lancashire a distance of just 26 kms and 340 days from Rawcliffe Moss.

Reed Warbler

We still wait for details of a Chaffinch caught at Out Rawcliife on 18 August 2011, R988282 anyone?

For more information on autumn Chaffinches, see this post http://anotherbirdblog.blogspot.com/2011/11/those-chaffinch.html