First Post

There was a touch of frost this morning for my first birding of 2017. I waited until the sun began to rise and then set off through Hambleton towards Out Rawcliffe, watchful for both patchy ice and any roadside birds. First off, and just on the edge of the village was a Kestrel in a now familiar spot. Later there would be a second Kestrel and then a third, the latter taking great interest in a flock of Linnets. 

But for now I stopped near a farm where I hoped that the morning frost might bring a Little Owl out to play. There’s no doubt that snow, ice and frost cause Little Owls to be more visible. My theory is that frozen ground makes the owl’s prey, typically worms, beetles, moths and small mammals, easier to spot with the prey less likely to escape into frozen earth and vegetation. 

Little Owls catch prey by stooping on it from a perch or running after it on the ground. The owl’s natural instinct probably makes it spend more time hunting in cold weather as a safeguard against the unforeseen. Also, and like other species of owl the Little Owl is in the habit of keeping a “larder” of food for the unexpected events of life. It’s rather like us humans stocking our cupboards with tinned food or filling the freezer with Hovis. Unfortunately, fresh voles don’t come with a “use by date”, nor is an owl very house-proud in cleaning behind the fridge; as any ringer will testify, the content of an owl nest is often extremely messy and very smelly. 

Little Owl

 

The owl was both watchful and at the at times disinterested enough to close its eyes and face into the morning sun. Shame it was a little distant, but at least one for my non-existent year list. 

I found myself along Crook Lane where Fieldfares lived up to their name by feeding in roadside fields. During the morning I noted that almost without exception our local hedgerows are now devoid of hawthorn berries, the favoured autumn food of the Fieldfare as they now switch seamlessly to searching for earthworms and field dwelling insects. I saw a dozen or so Redwings along the lane but they were gone as soon as look at them. If anything an always nervous Redwing is shyer than the watchful Fieldfare. 

Fieldfare

The roadside flood at Rawcliffe Moss is no longer a budding lake but just a very damp and obviously still soggy pasture with dozens of Lapwings probing the ground and gulls waiting to test their piracy skills. Across the far side there was a fence-sitting Buzzard and closer, a Kestrel that flew periodically into the building and then out again to sit along the fence. Two Pied Wagtails here. 

At Union Lane were 40 or more Fieldfares and 8 Stock Dove, both in exactly the same field as last week. And at Gulf Lane came the third Kestrel of the morning keeping watch on our set-aside where 200+ Linnets flew around, flew around, and then flew around again. The Kestrel was definitely making the finches nervous and although a Kestrel feeds mostly on mammals, should an opportunity arise, the Kestrel would take a Linnet. 

Cockerham Moss Edge held a distant flock of several hundred Pink-footed Geese. The geese were adjacent to a private farm track a good half mile away and with new groups arriving as I watched. I could have driven down the track but decided to leave the geese feeding rather than risk sending them back into the air and towards the sound of gunfire. 

Pink-footed Geese

Around the moss road to Crimbles; 40 Curlew, 35+ Lapwings, 1 Grey Wagtail, 1 Pied Wagtail, 1 Skylark, 2 Reed Bunting, 7 Tree Sparrow, 15 Chaffinch, 18 Fieldfare, 12 Blackbird, 2 Song Thrush and 1 Mistle Thrush. 

The Mistle Thrush is the largest of our UK thrush family but equally as shy as all of the others. One rattled off from our back garden the other day when I came by the side of the garage and surprised the thrush feeding on what’s left of the crab apple tree. Any day now male Mistle Thrushes will begin their loud singing from a high point in the landscape, usually the tallest tree, and often on a stormy day. “Stormcock” is an old English name for the Mistle Thrush because unlike most birds it sings in the heaviest of weather. “Singing in the Rain” - no problem to a Mistle Thrush. 

Mistle Thrush

Turn left at Crimbles and I’m soon back at Braides Farm where the frost put paid to much other than 200+ Golden Plover, similar numbers of Lapwings and 50 or so Redshanks. 

Redshank

Apologies that my pictures are a little distant today. Sometimes these birds just don’t want to play ball with us birders. 

Anyway I have decided to spend my generous £100 Christmas Bonus towards upgrading my current camera to a later version in the hope my photography will improve.

In any case Mrs Theresa Maybe, and with your own and other leading Minister’s veiled threats to target the oldies. A miserly £100 is hardly enough to buy something really trendy and useful like an iPhone 7, an Apple Watch or a Microsoft Band is it? 

Happy New Year folks.

Linking today to Eileen's Saturday and  World Bird Wednesday.

Last Post

Just one day to bird before the end of 2016, and I finished on a reasonable high. 

There seemed to be Lapwings everywhere I went this morning. In virtually every field I passed I heard the calls of Lapwings and saw their black and white patterns against the sky, or when I stopped to scan, found more hidden amongst the black peaty fields. 

Lapwing

It’s not too surprising as mid-winter is when widespread counts reveal the UK and Ireland winter population to be between 2 and 3 million individuals. That number includes a high proportion of birds from Scandinavia, Denmark, Holland and North Germany that join Lapwings from Northern Britain that move to more coastal and warmer locations.

If here in Lancashire we have one of our rare sustained spells of ice and snow many of these same Lapwings will move even further west over the Irish Sea to spend the winter in Ireland. But for now there are many, many thousands of Lapwings in this small part of Lancashire we call The Fylde, a coastal plain in west Lancashire, England. It is roughly a 13-mile (20-kilometre) square-shaped peninsula, bounded by Morecambe Bay to the north, the Ribble Estuary to the south, the Irish Sea to the west, and the Bowland Hills to the east. The eastern boundary is approximately the location of the M6 motorway. 

Fylde, Lancashire

Flat Fylde

My early route took me over Stalmine Moss, Union Lane, Lancaster Lane and then Skitham Lane towards Garstang and then the same in return mode. Stopping here and there I clocked up brief views of a Barn Owl which at least made me pause and look harder. It was then I started to count 1000+ Lapwings in many fields as well as to discover 60+ Fieldfare, 25+ Chaffinch, 2 Yellowhammer, 8 Stock Dove, 2 Buzzard, 1 Kestrel, 1 Grey Heron and 1 Little Egret.

It’s a good bet there’s not been much traffic, motorised or pedestrian, if there are Pink-footed Geese in roadside fields. As usual and for weeks the geese have hid themselves away from the prying eyes of both shooters and birders so I was surprised to see 500/600 in the field closest to Lane Ends and the A588. Needless to say at the first sign of pedestrians and birders standing up beside their car, heads lifted and the geese stopped their feeding to go walkabout in the opposite direction. 

Pink-footed Geese

For goodness sake birders. The geese need to feed after spending the previous 14 hours of a dark and cold winter’s night out on the saltmarsh. These geese are shot at on a daily basis. They are extremely wary and will take flight at the first hint of trouble, more so if folk leave their car to clatter about with tripods and then stand in full view when they could just as well stay in the car and observe the geese from a wound down car window. It’s called “fieldcraft”.

After watching the geese move to a quieter spot I tackled the A588, Murder Mile, where good numbers of Lapwings fed in the roadside fields but where it’s too dangerous to stop a car at almost any time of the day. 

At Gulf Lane I counted 200 or more Linnets finding natural food while a single Stock Dove helped itself to our millet/niger mix. We’re adding rape seed any day now to hopefully make a difference to the Linnets’ feeding routine. 

Linnets

At Braides Farm and hung over the gate was a Christmas gift, a meal of roast goose waiting for collection. "Pluck it yourself". there's no fast food in Pilling and Cockerham.

Pink-footed Goose

Also - 800 Lapwing, 400 Golden Plover, 80 Black-tailed Godwit, 40+ Redshank, 30 Wigeon, 15 Teal, and 9 Shoveler. 

 Lapwing

Redshanks

The tide was in at Conder Green where the wintering Spotted Redshank “showed well” among 120 Teal, 30+ Redshank, 6 Curlew, 6 Little Grebe, 1 Grey Heron, 1 Little Egret and then 1 Jack Snipe which didn’t show at all well. 

Spotted Redshank

The “half-snipe” had been moved by the rising water and then flew across my line of vision, landed near a Redshank and tucked itself into a clump of marsh grass from where it failed to show again, despite me watching the exact spot for several minutes. That’s what Jack Snipe do best, squat down and stay dep in cover until something or someone disturbs them. Even then one will fly fly just a short distance before dropping back into vegetation. 

Snipe and Jack Snipe - Henrik Grönvold - wikimedia commons

This is the last post for 2016 from Another Bird Blog. Tomorrow Sue and I prepare for the invasion of New Year’s Day and a house full of eight adults and five grandchildren. If I survive there will be more news soon from Another Bird Blog. 

In the meantime here's wishing every one of my readers a Happy, Prosperous and Bird-Filled 2017.

Linking today to Anni's Birding and Eileen's Saturday.

Mostly Linnets

A disappointing session of ringing this morning with just three new Linnets caught. All the more frustrating to watch the usual 250+ Linnets fly all around the area and then feed mostly away from our couple of single panel nets. The problem now is one of low winter vegetation and nets without background becoming more visible to overflying Linnets. Andy and I are now resigned to remaining winter catches of single figures but view the entire project as very worthwhile. 

Flocking in their winter habitat of flat, weedy fields or maritime marsh makes Linnets very difficult to catch. As such the data on wintering Linnets is under-represented in the national database of Linnets where 89% of the species’ recoveries are from the months April to October. 

Richard the farmer has told us of his plans to reseed the same plot this spring and to start an additional new plot about half-a-mile away. Both plots should hold plenty of Linnets by late summer of 2017. In view of this and also of the suspicion that many Linnets that visit us in autumn and winter may be much more than local birds, we hope to add value to our project by colour ringing the ones we catch. Broadcasting the project to bird watchers and the public in other parts of the UK will hopefully generate a number of sightings of our Linnets. 

Linnet

Linnet

We didn’t catch any obviously “different” Linnets this morning, but I did a little more research on the idea that some of our locally wintering Linnet flocks may be from Scotland while hiding a few of the seemingly forgotten Scottish race of Linnet, Linaria cannabina autochthona. The Latin autochthona means endemic/original. 

David Callaghan 2011 - "The autochthona is not recognised by all authorities, as this longer-winged and more slender-billed form is likely to be the end of a continent-wide cline. With a population of up to 90,000 pairs, it is most abundant in eastern Scotland, though this positioning also opens it to potential intergradation.” (with cannabina from the south or cannabina from Scandinavia). 

Scottish Birds 2003 - "Bannerman (1953) does add "perhaps also Ireland", remarking that Irish resident birds are variable though "mostly dark and match those from Scotland". Nevertheless, no comparative analysis of this observation seems to have been undertaken."  The BOU Records Committee (BOU 1971) sees "the subspecies as 'poorly distinguished', however, no real determination of subspecies has so far been made regarding the recent colonisation of the Outer Hebrides (Murray 2000). Whilst the race appears to be largely sedentary, we still have much to learn about the overall distribution and movements of autochthona.” 

Add to the above that in recent years the Linnet has recolonised Shetland (from Scotland or Scandinavia) and the mystery deepens. 

I found two pictures on the Internet, specimens only. Note the earlier scientific name of Acanthis now Linaria.

Linaria cannabina cannabina

Linaria cannabina autochthona 

We took a drive down to view Richard’s plot at Sand Villa for 2017 - looks promising.  When Andy drove off to continue his Christmas and New Year chores I took a look at Braides Farm. 

Combined approximate counts from Braides and Sand Villa: 600 Starling, 190 Curlew, 900 Lapwing, 300 Golden Plover, 60 Redshank, 170 Pink-footed Geese, 140 Wigeon, 30 Teal, 12 Shoveler, 6 Little Egret. 

Back home I counted 15-20 Goldfinch in the garden with 6 Blackbirds and the now almost resident but single Fieldfare. That reminds me, I must go and top up the feeders and then hit the shops to find some cheap apples to chuck out.

Fieldfare

More soon from Another Bird Blog.

Linking today to Stewart's World Bird Wednesday.

Agony Birding. A Christmas Story.

Barbara is heading our way for the weekend.  Looks like the only bird to see for a day or two will be the Christmas Turkey.

Storm Barbara

Meanwhile, I thought Agony Aunts were for the red tops and glossy magazines, not the birding press? Seems I’m mistaken as I found a snippet in this month’s copy of Birding Monthly under the column heading 'Ask Dorothy - Birding problems – Advice about ID, Photography, Birding Gear and Personal'. 

Suitably intrigued, I read more. It's an unhappy tale but a cheerful ending could be in sight.

“HELP! My partner’s lost his birding mojo.” 

"DEAR DOROTHY: I first met my partner 3 years ago on a cross country trip to Spurn to twitch a Red-flanked Bluetail. Frank was stood in a line-up of birders scanning for the bluetail. As people moved around chatting I found myself next to this good-looking guy who carried all the latest birding gear. He didn’t seem to notice little me even though I asked him lots of questions about birds, Spurn and Yorkshire in general. I quizzed him about his brand new top-of-the-range-optics and his life list, but at best I received a mumble or two in grudging recognition of my presence. I was impressed though when after a minute or two Frank latched onto the target bird as all the other dudes around just gossiped away. Eventually we grilled the bluetail together as he slowly loosened up enough to chat for a while. After what seemed an eternity he let me raise his monopod and then to test his Optigrand Super Zoom. That was a very impressive piece of kit, I can tell you. 

Well to cut a long story short Frank and I became best buddies, and pretty soon a pair of inseparable lovebirds. But now three years later and after many a shared tick and twitch all over the UK, Frank has mutated into a birder I don’t recognise. He no longer gazes at Birdforum, has cancelled his subscriptions to Rare Bird Alert and Birdwatch magazine, is reluctant to hit the road for new birds, and has even joined the RSPB.  Just last week I had a plane chartered to fly to Shetland for a First for Britain, a Greener-green Warbler (Phylloscopus borinus), but he said “No thanks chuck, I have a survey to complete, and then I need to enter my Birdtrack records on the PC”. The final straw came yesterday when he 'came out' as being a closet member of the BTO. 

What has happened to my Frank? Have I lost my birding soulmate? Is there life after twitching? 

Betty. Bootle, Merseyside". 

Lovebirds

"DEAR BETTY: My heart goes out to you. Many of us steadfast twitchers are mortified when a valuable member of the birding community is lost to the questionable pursuits you describe. It sounds like your Frank is in danger of becoming something we call an “ornithologist”. It’s a nasty illness that affects the weak-willed and the delusional. Very often such people are loners and less well-adjusted to the social and communal aspects of birding.

Try dialogue and compassion. Be tolerant and persuade him of the errors of his ways through displaying how much you still care for him. Try showing him pictures and videos of all the good birds he’s missed lately: that should bring him to his senses. 

If all of that fails, and as a last resort, I recommend Surveygone™, available from your local chemist. It’s guaranteed to erase all anti-twitching thoughts and to end the compulsion for taking part in bird surveys. It's guaranteed to be successful 99.9 per cent of the time. Just put a few drops in his morning coffee for a week or so. He’ll be right as rain in no time and back to normal by Christmas. 

"Surveygone"

Best wishes and Good Luck. DOROTHY"

Betty and Frank, Birders 

So Dear Friends, you may think that birding is a fun, harmless pursuit, but there are hidden dangers. Birding can result in real tears, broken relationships, and having to seek professional advice from complete strangers. 

A Happy Christmas to all my readers but do take care out there in The World of Birds. It’s a dangerous place. 

Linking today to Anni's Birding.

At the End of The Rainbow

It’s been a busy week with pre-Christmas tasks and events literally taking centre stage by way of preparation for the holiday and three grandkids’ seasonal plays to attend. Add to that mix the ever-present rain or the promise of, and I’ve struggled to find birding time. 

But I managed an hour or two this morning even though I still dodged the frequent showers. Along Burned House Lane my passing car disturbed a Buzzard from the roadside hedgerow leaving the raptor to drift off over the fields and quickly out of sight. 

I stopped at Lane Ends where with the tide well out in the distant channel there wasn’t too much at lurking at the end of the Pilling rainbow except huge banks of dark cloud following on. Ten or twelve Little Egrets can be seen here come rain or shine and everything else was a long way off although vocal by way of good numbers of Whooper Swans and Pink-footed Geese. 

Pilling and Cockerham Marsh

There was a steady procession of Pink-footed Geese heading off the roost towards both Knott End and Cockerham. I found lots on the deck later at the back of Braides Farm but so distant as to make detailed examination almost impossible. I counted more than 50 Whooper Swans flying from the marsh roost and then inland towards their daytime feeding spots. 

Whooper Swans

Whooper Swans

Pink-footed Geese

I stopped at Gulf Lane to feed today’s 130+ Linnets with a millet/niger mix. Andy and I have been putting food out even though there’s not any evidence of the Linnets taking it in preference to the natural food on offer. We think most of the food is being taken by mammals but hope the Linnets find our food if and when cold days and nights arrive. At the moment it is just wet and windy with the prediction suggestive of no ringing opportunities for a week or more. 

Linnets

At Braides Farm it’s 500 yards to the sea wall where there might be birds on the marsh but nowhere for a birder to stay out of sight on the flat lands of South Morecambe Bay. Better instead to look left from the gateway where at a distance of 400/550 yards a large flood holds a constantly changing spectacle of several thousand waders and wildfowl. 

Braides Farm

What a sight - approximates mostly: 600 Pink-footed Geese, 1500 Lapwing, 155 Redshank, 450 Golden Plover, 34 Black-tailed Godwit, 48 Teal, 70 Wigeon, 4 Shoveler, 190 Curlew, 350 Starling and 300 Black-headed Gull 

Lapwing and Redshank

A quick look at Conder Green produced 230 Teal, 18 Redshank, 4 Little Grebe, 2 Goosander, 2 Shelduck and 1 Grey Heron. Herons have been pretty scarce of late and if present always outnumbered by Little Egrets and now in recent times, almost outstripped by sightings of Great White Egrets. How the fortunes of species change! 

Back soon. Hopefully before Christmas.

Linking today Eileen's Saturday. 

Scottish Mist

Next Wednesday is the shortest day of our gloomy northern winter. I for one can’t wait for that extra few minutes tacked onto each morning and every evening; and with a bit of luck we’ll have a few frosty, clear mornings to lift the shutters of winter. 

In the meantime a 0815 start was required on Saturday to meet Andy at the set-aside plot for a chance of catching more Linnets. There’d been up to 250 Linnets both flying around and dropping into the weedy field during the week when I stopped to take a look. With a prediction of 3mph together heavy cloud the conditions appeared ideal. The forecast proved accurate enough except that the dank overnight air and lack of wind had created a morning fog. The fog hung around all morning, turning once or twice into a mist when without much success the hidden sun tried to break through. 

In the circumstances we were pleased enough to catch eleven new Linnets and push our project total over 150 since early October. 

Linnet

A couple of the male Linnets we caught were noticeably dark on the mantle & scapulars as well as being heavily streaked below. Both had wing lengths of 84mm, at the top end of the range for a male Linnet. As first winter birds retaining their juvenile wing we might reasonably expect the same birds to reach an adult measurement of 85/86mm by late summer of 2017. 

We considered that these individuals could be of the Scottish subspecies of Linnet, Linaria cannabina autochthona (Clancey 1946), as opposed to the Common Linnet Linaria cannabina cannabina of the British Isles and continental Europe. 

After a little search I found the below information in Scottish Birds 2003. 

“Although autochthona is believed to breed throughout most of Scotland, it grades into cannabina and no precise boundary can be drawn between the 2 races. There is only a solitary record of a Scottish bred Linnet = autochthona recorded away from Scotland. The bird, ringed as a chick near Sanquhar, Dumfries & Galloway on 18 June 1928 was recovered near Egremont, Cumbria, England on 8 November 1928.“ 

To that apparently single record we can add our own recent recovery of a chick ringed in Shetland on 14th June 2016 (presumably autochthona) recovered here at our Pilling site on 24th October 2016 and a distance of 674kms from Shetland.  This young male also measured up at 82mm.

Saturday was a terrible morning for photography in which to show how different these few males were, but needless to say we will be closely examining all Linnets in the coming weeks to try and ascertain if there are more Scottish Linnets wintering hereabouts. 

Birding in the gloom with visibility of around 50 yards meant our birding highlights were the immediacy of 250+ Linnet, 2 Little Egret, 2 Snipe, several Curlew , a few dozen Lapwings and a Sparrowhawk eyeing up the Linnets from on high. 

Sparrowhawk

I know the picture above is not the finest but this was the best I could do on such a foul, misty morning. Never mind, there’s always another day on Another Bird Blog, so comeback soon for more bird news and views.

Linking today to  Stewart's World Bird Wednesday.

Where Did It Go?

It’s that time of year and an excuse to delve into the archives for a review of the year on Another Bird Blog. 

Today’s post is my entry in Jim Goldstein’s 10th annual best photos of the year blog project. It's at http://www.jmg-galleries.com/blog/2016/12/14/blog-project-photos-2016/. Take a look, and enter your own pictures. 

I am posting a picture for each month of 2016. As the blog sub-title suggests, and for new visitors to this blog, there are tales of bird ringing and bird watching together with a spot of bird photography. Don’t forget to click each pic for a bird close-up and slide show. 

In January and midwinter in the Northern Hemisphere most folk are a little bored of short, dark and dismal days that mostly coincide with days of wind and rain. The lack of sun makes us yearn for a little warmth and brightness as an antidote to days spent in layers of clothes and sitting next to radiators while surfing and blogging. 

In January Sue and I travelled via a four hour flight to Lanzarote for a dose of winter sun. The Trumpeter Finch, Bucanetes githagineus, is a small passerine bird that is relatively common but far from numerous in Lanzarote. The huge and brightly coloured parrot-like bill gives the bird a somewhat comical appearance.

Trumpeter Finch

Trumpeter Finches breed in the Canary Islands, across North Africa, and in the Middle East and into central Asia. There is a small European population in southern Spain where the species is essentially non-migratory with most birds largely resident. In the summer of 2005 there was a notable eruption of this species into north-western Europe, with several birds reaching as far as England, where it remains a very rare bird and subsequently one that does not appear on the list of many twitchers. 

February proved to be a good month for catching Siskins Spinus spinus, at our ringing site at Oaeknclough, near Garstang, Lancashire. The 60 ringed there during the month provided a couple of later recoveries in Scotland and close to where the Siskins would breed.

Siskin

March at Oakenclogh continued the finch theme with good catches of Lesser Redpolls, Acanthis cabaret, a close relative of the Siskin. Both are members of the finch family, Fringillidae. There is evidence of Lesser Redpolls visiting garden feeders on a more regular basis, so much so that several used my own niger feeders for a week or more. 

 Lesser Redpoll

A male Reed Bunting is a handsome bird. Sparrow-sized but slim and with a long, deeply notched tail, the male has a black head, white collar and a drooping moustache. Females and winter males have a streaked head and don’t look nearly as striking as a male in April song. Here’s a male looking for a mate at Cockerham in April 2016. 

Reed Bunting

Most blog regulars will know of my addiction to May in Menorca, Spain. Every year I try to take pictures of Bee Eaters and rarely do I succeed except perhaps the in-flight picture from May 2016 is one of my better efforts. 

Bee Eater

During June and July I made trips up to the Bowland Hills about twenty miles from my usual birding patch . It’s where waders like Redshank, Oystercatcher and Snipe breed in the wet meadows. Without a hide, a wound down car window is almost as good. However, a certain degree of knowledge about a species’ habits, preferences and likely reactions is essential before embarking on a trip and expecting a result. 

 Snipe

  

Oystercatcher

August proved to be a mega month for picturing Barn Owls. I latched onto a pair with a regular hunting beat. Once again, knowledge of a species’ habits is essential, as is respect for UK law which protects Barn Owls from disturbance. I am reminded of the antics of a “togger” I watched this year who chased a Barn Owl across fields and prevented the owl from hunting as it should. My own picture below was obtained by waiting for an owl to appear and then let it do what comes naturally. 

 Barn Owl

“Togger” is urban slang for photographer; specifically, one who takes photographs out of a passion for photography and a desire for kudos from other toggers, rather than out of a passion for birds. Most birders I know substitute the letter “s” for “g” when discussing toggers and their antics. 

2016 began badly for Swallows. Poor weather on their journey north killed many off before they could arrive in Britain. Any that managed to set up breeding territories were slowed and frustrated by a cool, cold and wet spring. In most years I expect to take many pictures of Swallows; not in 2016. 

The weather improved during August and September allowing Swallows to catch up a little. Below is one that made it from the nest. Let’s all wish for a better 2017 for our struggling Swallows. 

Swallow

September and it’s time for a non-birdy picture. “Thank goodness for that”, goes up the cry. The picture is from Skiathos, the other love of our life and another Mediterranean island that Sue and I visit each September. What could be better than relaxing in a beachside taverna with a cold beer while watching the famous blue and white Greek flag flutter in the warming sun? Thanks to the shenanigans of Germany and the European Union the proud Greek people continue to take a battering which they do not deserve. “Yammas” to each and every one of my Greek friends. 

Skiathos, Greece

October 8th promised to be just another average day of ringing up at Oakenclough for Andy and I. By midday we called a halt at 123 birds caught and both ringers cream-crackered after processing more than 30 birds every hour. Whoever said that ringing birds was easy work? The biggest surprise was that our catch included 61 Goldcrests. This included several greyish looking individuals which almost certainly originated from Fennoscandia a day or two earlier. 

Goldcrest

A tiny bird that weighs not much more than 5gms would seem to be no candidate for long distance migration. However, ringing has shown regular movements from countries around the North Sea and Baltic into Britain for the winter. One has even reached us from Russia and several from Poland, though Norway, Sweden and Finland are their usual starting points. It seems amazing that any of them can survive two journeys as well as the cold weather but some clearly do, as several Goldcrests ringed in the UK in winter have been found back home in Scandinavia. 

Another Scandinavian visitor that brightens up our UK winters is the Fieldfare. It is a highly gregarious creature that arrives on our shores in sometimes huge numbers, this November being no exception. It seems a contradiction that the species is gregarious but also intensely shy, but that is the truth as anyone who has tried to photograph them will confirm. In November I caught up with Fieldfares in a row of hawthorns at Cockerham where I snapped the picture we all crave – a Fieldfare holding its prize of a bright red Christmas berry. 

Fieldfare

December was almost a write off with many grey, dismal days and never ending rain. Andy and I had been busy at our Linnet project since early October at one small site at Pilling where to date and nearing the end of 2016, we have caught, ringed and fully processed 140 Linnets. The Linnet is a declining farmland bird whereby anything we can do to collect data on its current abundance is a positive contribution to conservation. 

Linnet

Thanks for wading through this post. I hope that everyone that’s done so will return to Another Bird Blog soon and read more about my bird ringing, bird watching and bird photography. And finally, thanks to Jim Goldstein for hosting this get together of like-minded folk for yet another year.

Linking today to Anni's Birding and Eileen's Saturday.