Redpolls, Crossbills and a Funny Feather....

Having now almost certainly started into winter, I am now back to catching wintering Redpolls, although far less than the last few years.  But at present of the 80 birds caught, exactly 10% have been Common Redpolls (one of pictured below).  Goldcrest numbers also seem to have been very low this autumn.

 

Although most of the bird attention on Leith Hill has been focused on people trying to hunt down the female Two-barred Crossbill that has now been present since about late July, today saw our first catch of Common Crossbill since the end of May 2012.  The ten birds involved were two adult female, four 1st year females, three 1st year males and a juvenile male.  The latter was quite a surprise to me, still retaining some of its juvenile body feathers, in that I didn't think that Crossbills bred this late in the year and should be only now just starting to think about setting up territories to breed.  (A few pictures below.)

 



Note that the bill of this bird crosses top to the right whereas the bird below crosses top to the left.  I will try to keep track with future catches as to how many are one way or the other... which will be the more common?

Have also been meaning to post this photo of a Chiffchaff that I caught a few weeks ago that had a large feather growing out of the inside wall of its eyelid....  Never seen this before, but there is always something new to learn and discover.....

TWO-BARRED CROSSBILL and COMMON ROSEFINCH

The ringing sessions on Leith Hill over the last couple of weeks have been very memorable, but mainly for birds that haven't been caught!

28th September saw the first Redwings and Woodlark migrating through as well as impressive movements of Swallow and House Martin.  30th September saw continued good passage of hirundines as well as alba Wagtails, 70 Redwing, a large number of migrant Song Thrush and 2 Ring Ouzel (my first for Leith Hill, unknowing what was to come).

A short break with Rye Bay Ringing Group provided a great experience of a Swallow roost of over 10,000 birds and the amazing capture of a first year Common Rosefinch (below).

On returning to Leith Hill, 6th October produced at least 2 Raven, the first two Lesser Redpoll and Brambling, a Woodlark, 2 Swallow (late for here) and good numbers of thrushes including 15 Mistle Thrush, 30 Redwing and at least 4 Ring Ouzel.  But yesterday (8th October) set a new standard with a large amount of thrushes coming out of roost before dawn including at least 20 Song Thrush, 20 Blackbird, 100 Redwing.  The real excitement began with the first net round where the first bird was a Grasshopper Warbler (below), which on this late date and on one of the height points in the south east is somewhat unusual.  But whilst we were ringing this bird a group of 5 Ring Ouzel flew into trees to one side and a small number of Crossbill flew into another tree in front of us.  Paul takes a second look at the Crossbills and then shouts 'Two-barred'!  A female Two-barred Crossbill was sat at the top of the tree next to a male and female Common Crossbill sporting two blazing wingbars.  It didn't stay for long before flying off, but nearly an hour later flew over again with assumedly the same group of Commons.  Other birds that morning included the first Reed Buntings and only second Greenfinch for this part of the hill as well as a Brambling and 2 Woodlark.

It is not the first time though that this bird has been seen.  Crossbills have been a constant feature at Leith Hill for as long as I can remember, but inexplicably they vanished from the whole area in November 2012.  In mid July this year Crossbills were back and coincided with a small eruption of Two-barred Crossbills along the east coast, mainly in the north.  On 31st July amongst a flock of about 150 a female Two-barred Crossbill was seen briefly on the far eastern edge of Leith Hill at Redlands Wood by Martin Gray.  Ever since I have been keeping and eye out for small birds amongst the Crossbills and had a number of fleeting and uncertain views of one on 6th and 26th August, 22nd and 30th September, but nothing certain until now.

Hopefully it will hang around long enough to get some photos and for many others to see it as I believe it to be only the second ever for Surrey after one over 100 years ago!

Unusual Blackbird

 

A ringing session on Leith Hill on Tuesday was relatively quiet but turned up this unusual Blackbird.  It is obvious by its active moult that it is a first calendar year bird, still showing some juvenile plumage in its body, tail, flight feathers, primary coverts and greater coverts.  Its all black bill is also a sign of a first year bird.

What is unusual is its new adult plumage colour which although is definitely a male has a far more grey than black colouration and the breast feathers are also heavily scalloped with a very pale fringe.  All these features seem to point to this bird being more reminiscent of the continental subspecies sometimes known as 'stockamsel'.  Any comments welcome?

What a Summer?

As I write this post, the weather has started to turn and autumn is definitely here!  But after the disappointing summers of 2011 and 2012 this year has been a cracker.  Amazing what happens when forecasters don't suggest we are going to have a BBQ summer!  The last two months have seen quite a bit of change and a few surprises.

I have recently moved house to Broadbridge Heath and although lots to do now moved in I have managed to go a couple of ringing sessions in my new garden.  This has been very interesting with just four sessions of 2 hours with one 30 foot net and I achieved 107 new birds with highlights being an adult Mistle Thrush and singles of 4 species of warbler, Chiffchaff, Blackcap, Whitethroat and Sedge Warbler!

My North River CES was completed with a mixed result with a total of 228 individuals caught over the season.  This is just 20 more than 2011 which is quite surprising considering how much better the weather was this year.  Although it is interesting to note that most species saw a reduction in the number of adults which is probably a knock on effect from the poor season last year.  Most noticeable in Blackbird with just 9 adults caught compared to 14 and Chiffchaff with just 3 adults caught compared to 8.  Blackcap had a very surprising year catching the same amount of adults (13), but just 5 juveniles compared to 25 last year!  It will be interesting to see the national analysis and whether this is the same on a grander scale.

juvenile Redstart

On Leith Hill, my two sites here have been producing well with nearly 600 birds over the last two months, including 5 Redstarts (above), a Spotted Flycatcher and 5 Firecrests.  The latter not so surprising as Leith Hill now seems to be a great breeding site for them, but is interesting to note that in the same time frame just 10 Goldcrests have been caught.  Are the Firecrests taking over?  Certain species seem to be having great breeding seasons as well such as Siskin and Chaffinch, with both already having reached new record totals for here and a long way to go yet.  Compared to 2012, Siskin have reached 363 which is nearly a third more and Chaffinch has reached 203 which I have never reached three figures before!  Great Spotted Woodpeckers are also doing well with 25 ringed here so far this year...!  I have also caught 4 controls in the form of 2 Siskin (first ever summer ones), 1 Chiffchaff and 1 Blue Tit.  The biggest surprise though was an immature Reed Warbler (below) that I caught near the top of the hill, nowhere near any suitable habitat!

1st year Reed Warbler

What will the rest of the year hold?

Birds ringed:
Blackbird - 11
Blackcap - 66
Blue Tit - 155
Bullfinch - 1
Chaffinch - 96
Chiffchaff - 75
Coal Tit - 12
Dunnock - 10
Firecrest - 5
Garden Warbler - 6
Goldcrest - 10
Goldfinch - 1
Greenfinch - 4
Great Tit - 91
Green Woodpecker - 1
Great Spotted Woodpecker - 7
Linnet - 1
Long-tailed Tit - 1
Magpie - 1
Marsh Tit - 1
Mistle Thrush - 1
Nuthatch - 2
Pied Wagtail - 3 nestlings
Redstart - 5
Reed Warbler - 1
Robin - 48
Sedge Warbler - 1
Siskin - 75
Spotted Flycatcher - 1
Swallow - 19 nestlings
Treecreeper - 4
Whitethroat - 6
Willow Warbler - 44
Wren - 29

Barn Owls poor, but others have done well

The sudden burst of juvenile birds out of nests during the last six weeks has proved productive on my totals, for example, 119 of the 127 new Siskin and 83 of the 88 new Great Tits were first year birds.

Nest ringing has been productive with a number of Swallow, but also a large brood of Redstart and a brood of Kestrels (below).  The latter being fed almost exclusively on newly fledged Blue and Great Tits instead of the normal small mammal diet.  The three Mallards were my annual rescue of ducklings that have been born in enclosed gardens at Horsham Hospital.

Unfortunately, checking the Barn Owl boxes was not at all successful with every pair that I monitor in the Horsham/Dorking area having foregone breeding this year and this seems to be the same pattern across the south-east if not the whole country.  It is thought that the reason for this is that adults came out of the winter in such poor condition and all the flooding hammered the vole population, so the combination has left them no choice but to defer for a year.  But, on the positive front an adult male (below) caught on Leith Hill which was already ringed had been handled by me twice before! The last time was in another box on here on 9th August 2010 and prior to that in Capel (about 6km away) as a chick in a box on 20th June 2007!  So, over six years old and was actually the first Barn Owl I had ever ringed!  How cool is that!

After a very slow start my CES in Sussex is starting to pick up with highlights being an adult male Green Woodpecker (below top) and two first year Kingfishers (below bottom).  The lack of flooding this summer obviously being beneficial to the breeding of Kingfishers this year.  There have also been really good numbers of juvenile Robin and Wren and the only Treecreepers in this period.

My two sites on Leith Hill have been the most productive, especially for finches and tits, with all of the Siskin, Greenfinch and Goldfinch here and most of the Chaffinch, Great Tit and Blue Tit.  Nuthatch have also been high in number, with 11 first year birds caught here so far and the first Woodpigeon of the year.

Birds ringed:
Swallow - 1 + 23 nestlings
Blackcap - 10
Siskin - 127
Chaffinch - 38
Whitethroat - 3
Robin - 33
Bullfinch - 2
Blue Tit - 48
Goldfinch - 5
Redstart - 6 nestlings
Great Tit - 85 + 3 nestlings
Dunnock - 8
Coal Tit - 1
Garden Warbler - 2
Kingfisher - 2
Jay - 1
Magpie - 2
Mallard - 3 ducklings
Kestrel - 3 nestlings
Woodpigeon - 1
Green Woodpecker - 1
Stock Dove - 1
Great Spotted Woodpecker - 10
Blackbird - 13
Song Thrush - 2
Willow Warbler - 1
Wren - 11
Treecreeper - 4
Chiffchaff - 6
Greenfinch - 17
Nuthatch - 11

Cows and Net = Disaster

A recent ringing session at Leith Hill turned out to be rather expensive when between net rounds a group of Friesian cows invaded one of my rides and completely shredded the net that was set up!

Thankfully no birds were in the net at the time, but it took 3 of us nearly 10 mins to collect all the bits up and untangle from the bramble!

There goes £80......!

 

Cuckoo and Buzzard - A Month to Remember

The last month has been very active continuing to run my two Leith Hill sites as well as my North River Constant Effort Site and the first check of my many nestboxes.

North River continues to show a poor return on the number of birds being caught and only one juvenile has been caught so far, a sign of the poor season so far.  Although highlights were catching a Long-tailed Tit of a good age that I had originally ringed in Dec 2008 and although not part of the CES study also caught two adults and a juvenile Canada Goose!

The ringing on Leith Hill has produced a few birds of excitement, such as a male Cuckoo (above), first to be ringed here, a pair of Linnet (below) and 40 new Siskin including the first juveniles.

adult male Linnet

Checking the nestboxes proved very timely, with a marathon whole day of box checking resulting in two adult and 37 Jackdaw chicks, 3 Stock Dove chicks and an adult Barn Owl being ringed.  Whilst a number of nests have been found and chicks ringed including Dunnock, Pied Wagtail, Grey Wagtail, Wren, Blue Tit, Great Tit, Blackbird, Swallow, but the best being a single Buzzard chick (below).

nestling Buzzard

Birds ringed:
Barn Owl - 1
Blackbird - 4 + 8 nestlings
Blackcap - 8
Blue Tit - 6 + 8 nestlings
Bullfinch - 4
Buzzard - 1 nestling
Canada Goose - 2 + 1 nestling
Chaffinch - 12
Coal Tit - 1
Cuckoo - 1
Dunnock - 3 + 4 nestlings
Garden Warbler - 5
Goldcrest - 2
Goldfinch - 1
Great Tit - 7 + 5 nestlings
Grey Wagtail - 3 nestlings
Great Spotted Woodpecker - 4
Jackdaw - 4 + 37 nestlings
Jay - 3
Lesser Redpoll - 4
Linnet - 2
Long-tailed Tit - 3
Magpie - 1
Nuthatch - 2
Pied Wagtail - 5 nestlings
Robin - 5
Siskin - 40
Song Thrush - 6
Stock Dove - 3 nestlings
Swallow - 1 + 5 nestlings
Whitethroat - 3
Willow Warbler - 1
Wren - 4 + 6 nestlings

Winter or Spring?

Snow, strong northerly winds, rain and sub-zero temperatures along with cloudless skies, bright sunshine and a couple of the hottest days of the year has made this last month pretty unusual.  The birds have thought so too with certain summer species arriving up to three weeks late and some winter species still present. 

On Leith Hill winter species were highlighted with a late Redwing and Lesser Redpolls being the most ringed species (71), whilst all the summer visitors put together being less than a quarter of this (17).  Four of the eight Willow Warblers were retraps which included one ringed in 2011 and three in 2012.  Amazingly two of the latter birds were caught together on 2nd May 2012 as a breeding pair and were caught together again in the same place on 29th April 2013.  An amazing thing for two birds that bred then migrated seperately over 3000 km to Africa for the winter then returning to the exact same spot to breed again with the same partner.  Another highlight was the first Green Woodpecker of the year (below).

Adult male Green Woodpecker

This month also saw the first breeding signs and nesting activity of many species, but one of the highlights was a pair of Firecrest (below) caught on Leith Hill.  I also did my first checks of a few of my regular boxes, but most activity is late with only an adult Stock Dove to show for it.

Male and Female Firecrest

My first Constant Effort Site (CES) visit at North River also took place, but although only 16 birds were caught one was an adult female Grey Wagtail (below) and three of the four Blackcaps were birds ringed here last spring.

Adult female Grey Wagtail

Birds ringed:
Lesser Redpoll - 71
Blue Tit - 24
Siskin - 17
Chaffinch - 9
Great Tit - 8
Robin - 7
Dunnock - 7
Blackcap - 6
Chiffchaff - 5
Willow Warbler - 4
Wren - 4
Blackbird - 4
Coal Tit - 3
Great-spotted Woodpecker - 3
Nuthatch - 2
Whitethroat - 2
Firecrest - 2
Song Thrush - 2
Redwing - 1
Grey Wagtail - 1
Jay - 1
Green Woodpecker - 1
Stock Dove - 1

SHRIEK! It's a Shrike!

I nearly started this posting complaining about the last month's weather, but have felt the need today to finally celebrate the last couple of days sunshine.  It was so good, that I nearly got down to just two layers.....nearly!  Of the 23 species ringed this month there are a number of highlights.

This was the first month of the winter that I caught a good number of Siskin (80) after a bit of a drought since about September, and the latter part of the month saw a big array of migrants carrying lots of fat deposits.  Sizes were very variable from wings of 69mm to 80mm, whilst weights were between 10.9g and 16.6g.  It also included this unusual looking adult male below with an extended amount of black around the face.

Adult male Siskin

Adult male Siskin

It has also been a very good Fringilla month catching 34 Chaffinch of which the majority have been of the larger northern populations.  With wing lengths up to 96mm and weights up to 27.6g, some were bigger and heavier than either of the five male Brambling caught.  This was more Brambling than I usually catch in a year!

But today proved to be a very memorable one.  Not just because I finally caught my first Chiffchaff of the year, but that I caught my first and probably last GREAT GREY SHRIKE!  Although I had always thought it possible to see one on the heathland at Leith Hill, I never expected to catch one, let alone in the middle of the Rhododendron Wood a kilometre away from the heathland!  What a handsome beast though:

1st year Great Grey Shrike - the blood on throat and face is from its last kill, not from me!

remnant juvenile barring on the breast feathers give away that this is a 1st year bird...

...as do the nine unmoulted greater coverts.

What will the rest of April bring?

Waxwings, Siskins Return and Gambia Part 2

A pretty good start to the year with the first two months producing just over 300 new birds.

Leith Hill has been rather quiet on my heathland site, with very few Redpolls and Siskins have only just started to return, both of which are by far mainly adult birds.  The new woodland site has been very productive although the main numbers are Blue and Great Tit highlights have come in the form of seven Marsh Tit, eight Nuthatch and five Great Spotted Woodpecker.  The only major species that seem to be missing from this site is Wren, for which not a single one has been caught or heard which seems weird for a woodland!  Today's visit produced the first Sparrowhawk to be ringed at this site, but was suffering with some sort of callouses at the edge of the mouth (see below)

2nd year male Sparrowhawk with callouses in gape

2nd year male Sparrowhawk with callouses in gape

A group of up to ten Waxwing that were frequenting two straggly rowan bushes in front of Cranleigh Baptist Church on the village high street.  They had been there for a couple of weeks, so took the opportunity to attempt a catch and after a few near misses managed to catch this wonderful first-year female (below).  A week later I tried again and also only caught a single bird which amazingly was the same female from the week prior.

1st year female Waxwing

1st year female Waxwing

I was lucky enough to be able to go back on expedition to Gambia at the end of February, to assist in the ongoing project here to learn more about our summer birds on their wintering grounds and to learn more about West African birds.  This was an amazing ten days and I joined a brilliant team of like-minded and hard working people which made for a great experience.  Although we started slowly with relatively small numbers of birds this picked up and by the end caught 1222 new birds of 110 species.  Ringing highlights below:

Wattled Plover

White-faced Whistling Duck

Senegal Coucal

Yellow-billed Kite

1st year African Goshawk

White-crested Helmet-shrike

American Golden Plover - 1st to be ringed in Africa

Cuckoo Finch - one of three caught, representing the 2nd, 3rd and 4th record for The Gambia!

Hamerkop - one of only about 10 ringed in the world of which this is the third here in two years!

1st year Black-winged Stilt

End of 2012 Totals and start of 2013

With us now entering the start of a New Year I am planning to restart my blog after 6 months of absence, mainly due to just too much else going on!!  So to start off, below is a quick round up of the totals I achieved in 2012.  Highlights have been the 24 Barn Owl, 9 Tree Pipit, 7 Redstart, 2 Firecrest, 6 Spotted Flycatcher, 1 Rook, 708 Redpoll and 33 Crossbill.  Also, the unexpectedly large totals of 300 Goldcrest and 98 Coal Tit.  A big thank you to Paul Stevenson, Sue Walsh, Martin Gray and Claire Boothby for their help with my ringing this year.

Species	Full grown	Nestling	Total
Mute Swan	2	0	2
Sparrowhawk	2	0	2
Stock Dove	1	0	1
Woodpigeon	3	0	3
Collared Dove	2	2	4
Barn Owl	5	19	24
Tawny Owl	0	7	7
Green Woodpecker	1	0	1
Great Spotted Woodpecker	23	0	23
Swallow	4	39	43
Tree Pipit	9	0	9
Meadow Pipit	5	0	5
Pied/White Wagtail	0	7	7
Wren	59	0	59
Dunnock	35	1	36
Robin	77	8	85
Redstart	6	1	7
Blackbird	54	9	63
Song Thrush	19	0	19
Redwing	30	0	30
Reed Warbler	2	0	2
Whitethroat	9	0	9
Garden Warbler	12	0	12
Blackcap	58	0	58
Chiffchaff	88	0	88
Willow Warbler	64	0	64
Goldcrest	300	0	300
Firecrest	2	0	2
Spotted Flycatcher	6	0	6
Long-tailed Tit	23	0	23
Marsh Tit	3	0	3
Coal Tit	98	0	98
Blue Tit	504	6	510
Great Tit	234	16	250
Nuthatch	11	0	11
Treecreeper	11	0	11
Jay	4	0	4
Magpie	2	0	2
Jackdaw	3	15	18
Rook	1	0	1
Starling	3	0	3
House Sparrow	2	0	2
Chaffinch	88	0	88
Brambling	4	0	4
Greenfinch	55	5	60
Goldfinch	96	4	100
Siskin	224	1	225
Linnet	1	0	1
Common Redpoll	301	0	301
Lesser Redpoll	265	0	265
Redpoll (Common/Lesser)	142	0	142
Common Crossbill	33	0	33
Bullfinch	3	0	3
Total	2985	121	3129