Showing posts with label Paris. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Paris. Show all posts

Sunday, June 6, 2021

A French Bonus

Saturday. The bright, sunny, and wind-free morning was perfect for a return to the Sand Martin colony at Cockerham where a motionless mist net would be hidden in the shade of the quarry face. 

Andy and I had decided to return knowing that unlike the last visit, there would be youngsters this time.  At first we caught no young, just adults coming and going on their early morning forays. 

Very soon along came “MUSEUM PARIS” with number 8998514, an adult female. The French ringed Sand Martin was a bonus, almost certainly ringed at Loire Atlantique where the River Lore meets the Atlantic Ocean, where ringers catch large numbers of migrating Sand Martins  on their journeys to and from Africa. 

Sand Martin

An hour or so later we’d caught 31 Sand Martins - 24 new ones, 6 recaptures, and Paris 8998514. Included in the 24 new Sand Martins were 11 birds of the year (juveniles) the remainder all adults. All are now on the database and with luck we should receive details of the French ringed one from the French ringing scheme soon. 

Sand Martin - juvenile

Sand Martin - juvenile
 
The martins kept us both fairly busy in taking them from our single 60 foot net and then processing each one by age, sex, breeding condition, wing and weight.  

Wing lengths varied with the shortest juvenile wing length of 84mm and then up to 105, the tinier wing lengths an indication of their age. During database input three of the juveniles threw up a DemOn message as potential errors on wing length measurement. The measurements were correct  and provided a clue to the fact that the young martins were very recently fledged and yet to complete their growth to adulthood.       

Meanwhile adult wings ranged from 103 to 111mm. The eleven juveniles weighed consistently heavier than the adults so it looks like the current fine weather is producing plenty of insect food. Juveniles - 12.3gms to 14.6gms adults from 11.8gms to 13.8gms. 

There was little time for birding except to note two pairs of Oystercatcher and a single but vocal Whooper Swan, the latter a left over from winter. By rights the Whooper Swan should now be several hundred miles away in Iceland. 

Whooper Swan

A pair of Little Ringed Plovers flew in briefly but left quickly when the resident pair of Oystercatchers started throwing their weight around. We think the plovers flew off in the direction of Conder Green where at least one has been present since April without any reports of breeding success.  

Little Ringed Plover

Back home in the garden there was a nest full of 5 Greenfinch chicks at an ideal age for ringing. 

It’s good to report that around here at least Greenfinches are doing better than for a number of years. The songs and calls of Greenfinches are back on the soundtrack of garden birds and I do think we have a small colony of the species in local gardens and hedgerows. 

“Trichomonosis is the name given to a disease caused by the protozoan parasite Trichomonas gallinae. It has been recorded in a number of garden bird species and is widely acknowledged to be the causal factor in the rapid decline of the British Greenfinch population first noted in late summer 2006.” 
 
Greenfinch

Let’s hope that Greenfinches are making a real comeback. A cause for celebration.

 

Monday, October 8, 2018

Recent Recoveries

There’s no birding or ringing for a day or two thanks to continuing poor weather so I’m posting information about a couple of recent ringing records. One is a Sand Martin at Cockerham quarry, the other a Linnet from our Linnet project at Gulf Lane, Pilling/Cockerham Marsh. 

Linnet 

We ringed Linnet number S800115 as a juvenile male on 10 August 2017- Biometrics: Wing: 81.0 mm. Weight: 17.8 g. Time: 10:00:00 hrs 

Our Linnet was recaptured on 04 May2018 at Walney Island Bird Observatory, Cumbria. Although the distance between the two points is negligible, the date of both the original ringing and the recapture are much more interesting. The month of August points to a juvenile dispersal, maybe from Cumbria but with a possibility that the bird’s place of birth was further north. The timing of its return on a northward track during May is within the peak of period of Linnet spring migration and when S800115 may have headed back to or near to its place of birth. 

I'm afraid that such recoveries often provide a few answers but inevitably throw up new questions. At least the bird is still in circulation and presents a small chance that should it be captured for a third time, more information on its travels may become known. This latest recovery fits into two previous recoveries and north/south movements to or from Gulf  Lane.

Linnet from Shetland 

Linnet to Lochinver

Linnet to Walney Bird Observatory

Duration: 267 days Distance: 23 km Direction: 300deg (WNW) Finder: Walney Bird Observatory, 9095 

Sand Martin 

On 23rd May 2018 we caught a French ringed Sand Martin at Cockerham Quarry.

Paris ringed Sand Martin

Sand Martin (Riparia riparia) - Ring no: 7193238 Ringing details- Age: 4 (adult) Ringing date: 10 August 2015 Site name: Hiers-Brouage, Charente-Maritime, France Ringer: Paris, -11

Sand Martin

Hiers-Brouage to Cockerham

Ring number 7193238 was recaptured at Cockerham on 23 May 2018. Duration: 1017 days Distance: 910 km Direction: 352deg (N)



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