A Boxing Day showdown with an old foe

It was a cold, crisp Boxing Day morning. The sun hadn't yet risen above the horizon and all was dark and calm. One by one, cars rolled up into the field and dark figures came walking through the grassland with handheld torches lighting the way through the icy darkness. The bird ringing team was being assembled, Avengers style, for what was going to become one of the most monumental mornings of mist netting there had ever been.

The nets went up, hoisted high to catch winter thrushes and weaved through hedgerows to intersect flyways to give us the best possible chance of a high capture rate. The light came up and the birds started coming in. Each net round resulted in a about 5-10 birds at least and we finished on a total of 60. It wasn't the numbers that made this morning special however, it was one very special guest that paid us a visit.

You see, there has been one bird that's given us the run around ever since I've been out ringing and has been taunting my trainer for the whole ten years she's been ringing the site. It usually makes at least one appearance a morning and you usually hear it before you see it. As we're stood processing the birds or enjoying a drink, a laugh will come drifting across the grassland. Then comes the culprit, a flash of a lime green rump as it flies in its up and down fashion across the landscape. It will land somewhere just out of sight and then laugh again - "You can't catch me!".

And let me tell you, we've tried. We've tried nets in every position with tape lures underneath them but all that's ever achieved is bringing it closer to the net before it lets out a laugh (known as a Yaffle) and disappears off into the trees on the edge of the wood where we suspect they breed. I am, of course, talking about the Green Woodpecker.

We've had near misses too, where it's skipped up out the grass  from where its been eating ants and flew agonising close to the net. Even more traumatising was my trainer's experience of seeing it in the net, only for it to get out as she approached and fly away, laughing. It's been an on going duel, a battle for the ages, a showdown between human and bird that has seen the feathered side come out tops every single time.

But not this day.

My trainer returned from a net round with a beaming smile across her face. It had taken no tape luring, no chasing it into the net, it had just found its own way there. A gorgeous adult male - a final festive gift before we head into the New Year.

Luckily I had bought my camera with me too.

Now THAT'S a bird!

That rump - Phwwooaarrr

Things like the red line under the eye are things that go completely unnoticed until you get so close.

One of the best birds I've had the privileged to see in the hand.

Roadside Ringing and more Fieldfares!

Next to a roadside isn't the first place you would think to put up some nets and do a spot of bird ringing but, earlier this week, I found myself in this exact position. Granted, it wasn't directly by the roadside - rather it was in an orchard separated from the road by a hedgerow. Even so it was still strange to have cars hurtling past at 50 miles an hour while you're extracting a Robin from a net.

I was out ringing with a fellow called Chris Lilley, a member of my ringing group who had kindly invited me out with him to a few sites I had never been too. The week before we had ringed over 20 Goldfinches in a garden of one of his family members which gave a perfect opportunity to compare and contrast many individuals of the same species. One thing I like about catching one species regularly is the chance you get to learn how to age or sex them. I had the chance earlier in the year to do the same with Yellowhammers, and it really gets ingrained in your brain how to process the bird when you deal with such a large number of them!

The orchard, which was in somebodies large garden, contained a number of feeders and brought in many different species. We saw lots of different birds, such as Yellowhammer, Fieldfare, Collard Dove, Redwing etc, but catch rates were slow throughout the day and we finished on a meagre total of about 15 birds for about 3 hours of ringing. It wasn't an unenjoyable morning by any means however as it was nice to see a new site, talk to Chris and get my hands on my first Tree Sparrows in what must be at least 2/3 years.

Nice to see these little guys in the hand again.

Fast forward the week to yesterday (Saturday), and I was back at the old stomping ground with the usual group trying our hand at catching the winter thrushes again. This time we were more successful than ever with an impressive haul of 3 Redwings and 3 Fieldfares on the first net round before I had to leave early for work. Well worth getting up in the dark and freezing your toes off for!

It'll take something special to beat this bit of winter ringing!

Catching a Fieldfare

The winter thrush luck is well and truly in at the moment!

After a nice haul of around 6 Redwing's (probably the most we've ever caught in a year) it was now the turn of only the 4th ever Fieldfare caught on the site to turn up in the net. As mentioned previously, catching the winter thrushes is a difficult task with Fieldfare being the most difficult of the lot. 

We had been tipped off by a fellow ringer on a technique that he had used with great success to catch Fieldfare with on his site. It's pretty simple - just increase the height of the poles you stick your mist nets on. This means that when you put a tape underneath, the Fieldfare are still caught despite being a much warier bird that most often stays high over the tape. You always have to set up in the dark to catch the winter thrushes, to get them as they emerge from their roosts. So there we were, in the dark, frozen fields getting ripped apart by hawthorn in order to get ourselves a Fieldfare.

We then went about setting up the other normal nets and the morning's ringing began. We were catching fairly well (adding 2 Redwing to the year total) and I took time out to nip back home to grab a drink to help me deal with this annoying cough I had developed. When I returned it was getting well into mid morning. Certainly past the time we should be catching Fieldfare. Most definitely. 100%. No chance. Nil. Nada.

Birds don't play by the rules.

Not only had it been caught fairly late in the morning, it had also been caught in one of our normal nets and not the one we had got up in the dark to put up. Birds eh?

Luckily it could be forgiven because, not only is it a ringing tick for me, but it is absolutely beautiful. 

The morning was rounded off by one final birdy bonus in the form of a stunning first year male Sparrowhawk. Two Sparrowhawks in the space of 3 weeks, as well as a plethora of other birds, and it certainly feels like Christmas is coming early for me!