A is for August, acros...but not Aquatics

August ringing is over with another 14 new acros in the Mallard nets today. Our final August totals for 2013 compared to previous years.

Mallard nets only            Sedge   Reed   Aquatic Warblers

August 2013                    274      178

August 2012                    106        66

August 2011                    323        58 

August 2010                    265        94        2(two)

A huge increase in Reed Warblers...breeders or  passage....BUT no Aquatics, remember no confirmed breeding of Reed Warblers  in either Ceredigon or Pembs until the mid/late 1970's !

A map of the reserve showing showing the Mallard net runs (extended since this map) in relation to the CES site. The huge area around Mallard is mainly phragmites. To the north the phragmites is a commercial cut and very healthy growth.

The Teifi Marsh site - which includes CES, full year totals are as follows compared to previous years

Teifi Marsh             Sedge    Reed   Aquatic Warblers

 2013 to date            481       275

 2012                       226       166

 2011                       620       289 

 2010                       612       437        2(two)

In both 2010 and 2013, large numbers of passage Sedge Warblers were ringed in early May. 

(May 2010 - 175 Sedge Warblers ringed mainly on two dates)

In 2010 we ringed 222 Reed Warblers on the CES site.....this year only 54.....

A shift in the breeding population to quality reed growth or ....?

A net plan of the CES site showing the Bass lagoon in front of Kingfisher hide and the net run spreading across to the river Teifi.

How we remember Mallard in the early morning....

Home in August......

A huge thanks to Wendy and Chris....all this data including today's (except 3 ringed tonight) is entered in IPMR..

66 for the last CES..

CES 2013 finished with 48 new birds, 17 retraps and a control.

Robin pictures don't often feature on the blog but D554*** was a special bird being our first Robin control. The BTO page about Robin recoveries is interesting with records of birds moving great distances including Cornwall to Highland and even one that made it from Sussex to Russia!
Some of the new birds included 13 Chiffchaffs,

 a Lesser Whitethroat

here showing the typical iris of a 1st year bird - dark olive-grey without a pale whitish crescent in the upper part that is seen in adults

and a juvenile moulting Great Spotted Woodpecker

Totals for the CES season and comparison with previous years once all the data is entered in IPMR

A few more acros....and a control !

Fat Sedge Warblers last night......
......with two over 13g and fat scores 3-5.

                                           (juvenile Sedge Warbler - Wendy)
This morning another eight new Sedge and eight new Reed Warblers....all the Sedge Warbler weights fairly low with only three just over 11g.
The highlight this morning, a control juvenile Sedge Warbler  weighing only 9.9g....
(with a Y608....ring number -  by our ring sequences an old ring !)

A few Blackcaps and Chiffs in the Mallard nets this morning too....
With CES tomorrow, what will the nets in the scrub hold for us....?

55 new acros, 3 Kingfishers and a nice recovery.

36 new Sedge and 19 new Reed Warblers...3 Kingfishers too...

The Mallard nets produced some numbers today !

Some migrating birds found us too, with 71 new birds out of 83 caught this morning also 22 new Sedge and 21 new Reed Warblers were also ringed during the week.

This table updates our August total compared to previous years

Mallard nets only            Sedge   Reed   Aquatic Warblers

August 2013 to date         190      110

August 2012                    106        66

August 2011                    323        58 

August 2010                    265        94        2(two)

A subject to look into though -

Our August total for Reed Warbler in the Mallard nets looks good but....

Our CES new Reed Warbler total with 1 session to go... 

2013 - only 35, compared with 2012 - 38,  2011 - 71,  2010 -165

Other highlights today included 3 Kingfishers (2 new) and this fine young male Sparrowhawk

(juvenile male Sparrowhawk - Tommy)
Sedge Warbler  D295194 was ringed on Skokholm on the 21st May 2013 at 0830.....controlled in a two panel net around the Mallard pond on the Teifi Marsh at 0550 22nd May 2013 - a bit of early morning ringing by Wendy following the 110 Sedge Warblers being ringed earlier in May.
A nice recovery as Wendy and I have an involvement in the re-establishment and accreditation of Skokholm as a Bird Observatory. A 60km movement in less than 24 hours from one Wildlife trust of South and West Wales reserve to another. See Skokholm blog

Teifi marsh waders

With numbers of waders increasing at various locations around the marsh and a very high tide just after dark it was perfect conditions to attempt to catch some to ring. Earlier in the week a Greenshank and a Snipe were ringed and last night a Curlew and a Snipe.

The mystery tail in the last blog belonged to the juvenile Snipe.
The Curlew was an adult in moult. In the wing a mixture of new, growing and old primaries can be seen.

When mist netting at dusk bats do sometimes find their way into the net. Usually on the Teifi these are Long-eared Bats but last night this Daubenten's Bat was caught and quickly released unharmed.

Whose tail is this?

This bird with a nicely marked tail was ringed on the Teifi marsh last night

Find out what it was in a blog later ..........

219 ringed for CES 11....

That was in 2010, today for CES 11 just 28 ringed and 7 retraps. The big difference was that today there was no fall of migrant Chiffs and Blackcaps.
Species highlights today were a juvenile Cetti's warbler and a juvenile Jay.

Between net rounds we were kept on our toes with a couple of calls from what sounded like a Golden Oriole. It wasn't seen or heard again and didn't find its way into a net!
A good record for the reserve was an immigrant butterfly, a  Clouded Yellow, seen flying around the slate waste near the ringing table for most of the morning.

News about some Sedge Warbler recoveries in the next blog.

Acro acro acros.....

Today - the 18th of August is the third anniversary of our second Aquatic Warbler......

Juvenile Reed Warbler - photo Wendy

Reed Warblers were the stars today with 13 out of 24 new acros...the other 11 being Sedge Warblers.
Our  study season is much improved on last year 2012, but still behind our better years. All figures below relate only to the Mallard net runs....not the CES site

                                 Reed Warbler  Sedge Warbler Aquatic Warbler
August 2013 to date               70                132                    
August 2012...........             66                106
August 2011...........             58                323  
August 2010..........              94                265                   2 (two)

Tomorrow is another day..
.....and the weather looks good for the week !!!

  

500 birds and 19 ringers.

Put a group of trainers, A and C permit holders and trainees together and you are bound to end up with ideas exchanged and new practices adopted, differences in techniques compared and friendships made. The ringing workshop arranged by Kelvin from BTO Cymru together with the TRG was successful and hopefully will be repeated again.

Arfon, Tony and Heather pictured here deep in teaching mode during a CES session on the reserve.
Having adopted the plastic bag method of putting away nets that we were taught in Costa Rica we shared our liking of the technique with others. Although Matt and Robin are looking a little bemused I think they approved!

Paddy's upland  ringing site at Ty Rhyg in the Preseli hills was popular with those that went there - a lot of birds of good variety including Willow Tits, Lesser Whitethroat, Redstart, Lesser Redpolls and Grasshopper Warblers. By Saturday night the wind speed had picked up and unfortunately the Tern catch at Ynyslas was unsuccessful but those that went had a chance to lamp some Dunlin. Despite getting back to their tents at 3am they all still managed to be up early for mist netting the next morning!
Sunday night at Strumble Head turned out to be the last session as Monday was far too windy to fit in a last couple of hours on the reserve. Conditions were not ideal to try to catch Storm Petrels but as it was to be a new experience for some we decided to put the net up anyway as a learning exercise. Our optimism was rewarded with 3 Storm Petrels by midnight.

Thanks to Pam at the excellent Cardigan Camping and Touring Caravan site where the BTO flag marked the happy campers corner.

Thanks also to the Welsh Wildlife Centre where lunchtime chats were fueled by the tasty food in the Glasshouse Cafe.
After the success of this year we hope to make this a regular event and recommend that other groups plan similar weekends to give ringers a chance for feedback on their skills and assessment for permit upgrades.

230 ringed today...stormies, and terns tonight.

BTO Cymru /Teifi RG Workshop.

With ringing and assessing at four sites this morning a number of birds were caught too. A successful morning with totals of 140 new birds at Ty Rhyg and 90 new birds on the marsh. Visiting ringers were involved in our CES, and handling different species from their regular sites.

Here, Charlie at our Mallard site with a Sedge Warbler, caught in one of our two panel nets -
Charlie gaining both experience with Reed Warblers and the use of the nets.....he finished the morning cutting a new two panel net ride for us.

The weather this evening slowed us down a bit, but a team has gone to the Dyfi with Tony Cross to catch terns, and a team has gone to Strumble Head to try for Storm Petrels...

Joint BTO Cymru / Teifi RG Workshop.

The workshop got off  to a catching start this evening with nets set at two locations in the marsh for roosting Swallows...
Catches of 74 and 47 achieved, surprisingly no Sand Martins.
Four teams will be ringing tomorrow at different sites, each with various combinations of  trainees, A & C permit holders and Trainers, with personal development and assessments the aim.

Cetti's Warbler, a species for tomorrow .....?
Updates daily from each site, showing the variety of ringing and species we can explore locally.

Another Pleasant Session ...

... down on the Teifi Reserve. A not particularly promising looking morning got off to a slowish start, but for some reason the traditional half-eight drop-off didn't happen and the birds kept coming in a steady sort of a way.

By the time I had to come away our total of new August Acros had increased by 20, more Reeds than Sedges this time, which is unusual, and the total of 52 captures included a few bonus birds; singles of Gropper, Redstart and Kingfisher, and 3 Linnets (the previous total for the reserve in recent years being 5).

One very juvenile Grasshopper Warbler, we'd like to think it came from a nest close by.

Sedge Warbler - juveniles and numbers

Juvenile Sedge Warbler. (Photo Dawn J)

With four days of August over already we are now into our continuing study of acro movements through our west Wales site, with 47 new Sedge Warblers ringed in the first four days a good year maybe ?
This follows 64 caught in July compared to last year's poor total of 24 in the month.
July 2011 was a good year with 151 Sedge Warblers ringed.

The net positions and lengths have increased this year, and the weather likely to be move favourable than last year when only 106 were ringed in August.
In Aug 2011 - 323 were ringed, and in 2010 - 265 were ringed.

More on recoveries and Reed Warbler numbers soon, but one retrap this year is rather nice,

Sedge Warbler L250110, we retrapped on the 1st August. 
He was ringed on the 15th May 2010 - a returning adult and part of a major movement that early May when we ringed 183 Sedge Warblers with the CES nets only.

L250110 is at least in his 4th year and he becomes our oldest known Sedge Warbler...and this is the first recapture of him !

See the link in the post below for more on our acro study.