SWEDEN - 5th August

A busy morning ringing at Fågelsjön – at least for the first few hours anyway produced some decent highlights, consisting of 2 Blyth’s Reed Warblers, both juveniles – one, the re-trap from three days ago plus a new bird (presumably from the same brood), a good 4 Red-backed Shrikes (an adult female and three juveniles), a pristine juvenile Lesser Whitethroat, 5 Marsh Warblers – all juveniles and a re-trap Thrush Nightingale.   

A brief look at Löten at lunchtime produced 2 Temminck’s Stints, 14 Ringed Plovers, 2 Little Ringed Plovers and 3 Ruff.   

This is the second Blyth’s Reed Warbler, new today with better photos showing the wing formula, the wing was top end at 65mm but its clearly emarginated on P4 and even a bit on P5 (much more obviously than on the previous bird) with a longish notch (12.0mm) and P2 equalling P5/6.   

The overall colour is also distinctive (although not 100% accurately represented in the photos) being somewhat in between Reed and Marsh Warblers with limited rufous tones – apart from the rufous wing panel visible in some photos which is a good feature of Blyth’s Reed and also lacking the yellowish / olive colour of a fresh juvenile Marsh Warbler.   The head pattern is also spot on for Blyth’s Reed but is not completely diagnostic.   

I don’t if its written anywhere else but I found that as soon as I held both the Blyth’s Reeds that I could tell they were different (!), the bird just felt softer and fluffier than the hundreds of Marsh and Reed Warblers that I’ve been handling over the last month.   It felt similar to other northern species that I’m familiar with such as Waxwing, Hornemann’s Arctic Redpoll and Northern Bullfinch where the feathers are naturally looser, giving a softer feel to allow warmer air to trapped next to the skin more readily in response to the colder conditions they experience.   I swear I’m not making this up but it would make sense as they are a more northerly breeding Acrocephalus species however, I certainly did not notice this on the five or six October vagrants I’ve handled on Fair Isle and North Ronaldsay.   

This is the original Blyth’s Reed Warbler re-trapped this morning, while still obvious, it was not as clear cut as the above new bird – maybe because I’ve got my eye in and am more aware of the features.   

Lesser Whitethroat   

Adult female Red-backed Shrike   

Thrush Nightingale