Ringing at... a sewage works?

Whilst the cold becomes the main bane of bird ringers lives at this time of year, the frost it leaves on the ground does create some impressive scenery. This was on full display at a sewage works site in Bakewell that I visited earlier this year, where the minus temperatures almost had the effect of making a sewage works look pretty!

We weren’t there to admire the scenery however and after the six nets went up the birds started rolling in. There were around 100 Pied Wagtails feeding on the filter beds all morning and it was these that made up the

 majority of our catch, with about 30 of the 60 birds caught being this species. There were also a handful of Meadow Pipits on the beds and a few of those manged to find their way into the nets, an unusual catch for winter ringing in our group.

I was also able to bag a couple of new species. A nice Grey Wagtail was a special treat, but I was more impressed with the 4 Starlings I was able to ring. These were a bird that I have had many close shaves with in the past, and a species I really wanted experience of to complete the list of common birds I'm likely to encounter when I ring in my garden. They are notoriously difficult to extract from nets and have a tendency to get the net twisted around the carpel (shoulder) of the wing. This can be quite daunting when first encountered, but with a bit of practice the knack makes for an easy extraction. They really are worth the trouble too. Absolutely gorgeous birds, even in their winter plumage, and truly underrated in every way.

A great morning all in all and a nice change from the usual winter ringing at feeding stations. 

Pied Wagtails were all over the place!

This little gem of a Grey Wagtail brightened up the day.

My favourite birds of the morning. Finally getting my hands on some Starlings!

Ringing in a Winter Wood-erland

New Years Eve.

To most 21 year old's, those three words only mean one thing. Getting so unbelievably hammered that by the time you've stumbled home you'd have added about 35 new birds to your life list after misidentifying lampposts and postboxes as birds that didn't exist before you pulled them out the imagination of your intoxicated brain.

To me however, it meant something slightly different. The morning of NYE (which is apparently an abbreviation thing that everyone does now), I was off out into the snowy woodland to try and catch some birds. We went to a feeding station deep in the woodland that had been diligently fed by a member of our ringing group and was attracting great numbers of birds.

The path down to the feeding station. Half expected to see a fawn stood under a lamppost down there.

The ringing didn't disappoint either. We finished on around 70 birds and got a great mix of species including 4 species of Tit, Chaffinch, Blackbird, Great Spotted Woodpecker, Nuthatch and 2 Jays.

Always a joy to catch these. A loud joy, but a joy nonetheless.

With feathers like this I think I can forgive them.

Nuthatch. Not seen one of these in the hand for a while!

GS Woodpecker in strike pose. A millisecond after this photo was taken, blood was drawn.

The day before I had been out ringing with another chap from my ringing group to ring a garden that has large finch flocks coming to the feeders. I was expecting to do brilliantly due to the snow bringing the birds to the feeders but when we arrived it was a fairly breezy morning. Unfortunately we only finished on 10 birds and I think it was a combination of the wind blowing the net and it being against the white snow covered background of the fields that made the nets too visible. I did see my first Lesser Redpoll of the winter however, with 6 seen on the feeders and one managing to find its way into the net.


Definitely worth getting up for.

Lesser Redpoll. Nothing "Lesser" about it.