Thursday 20 October 2016

GEDSER - 20th October


Yet another awesome day of ringing and tens of thousands of birds pouring overhead; a dry, overcast day with lightish winds meant another all day ringing session during which we managed an excellent 678 new birds again dominated by 486 Goldcrests which generally came through the very hectic morning (at some stages we were just down to two nets due to the sheer volume of birds being caught) while other birds making up the totals included 26 Wrens, 41 Robins, 29 Blue Tits and 19 Siskins.  

                There was some quality mixed in with the catch though with our fifth Yellow-browed Warbler of the autumn caught in the morning rush, 2 Firecrests, 12 Northern Long-tailed Tits (along with two Southern birds resembling the British ones), 3 Treecreepers, 2 Northern Bullfinches (plus one of yesterday’s re-traps) and another awesome Hawfinch.

                During the crazy hectic mornings ringing there were tens of thousands of birds piling over the garden to the east but unfortunately I didn’t have that much time to just appreciate the spectacle let alone get any counts of anything.   Chaffinches, Bramblings and Siskins were again passing over in big flocks but the day belonged to the thousands and thousands of Fieldfares (and smaller numbers of Mistle Thrushes and Redwings) which poured over the garden in huge flocks – amazing scenes!   The numbers I saw over the garden were a small percentage of what was happening through the day as numbers counted at the point included 65,430 Fieldfares, 12,170 Mistle Thrushes, 1,750 Redwings, 25,400 Chaffinch\Brambling and 1,590 Siskins!

                Mixed in the multitudes were a couple each of Woodlarks and Hawfinches, at least 200 Sparrowhawks, several Red Kites, a Common Buzzard, 20+ Swallows, a couple of Grey Wagtails, more probably Northern Bullfinches, several Crossbill flocks and a selection of the other usual bits and bobs – Redpolls, Greenfinches, Linnets, Skylarks, Meadow Pipits etc.    Also more obvious today were big flocks of Woodpigeons, Jackdaws and Rooks with a few Stock Doves thrown in.

                Definitely also worth a mention was a brilliant first winter Peregrine which perched on a dead tree on the edge of the garden and allowed close approach to enable some decent pictures to be taken; the bird had many features suggesting an ARCTIC PEREGRINE of the subspecies calidus, with its pale head, thin moustachial stripe on very white cheeks and the underpart streaking fading to much thinner streaks in the centre of the chest.
 


Putative Arctic Peregrine



Northern Long-tailed Tits; the bottom picture was when one of them perched on the net (but not actually trapped in it!) to look up at and investigate the rest of the flock which were caught!


Hawfinch
 

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