Colder...but....

It was quite nice to see a frost at last.  I think this is only the fourth time that I have had to scrape at the windscreen and the warm weather has been, from a winter thrush ringing point of view, most unwelcome.
After my last visit a couple of days ago when I managed to ring 19 Redwing, I had high hopes when I left the house this morning with crunchy frost under foot.
At the orchard the frost was just as good.  However, with the ground already water logged just about everywhere in the south east I reckon it will take several days of hard frost to get  the earth 'as hard as iron'.  No such luck at the moment with more rain forecast in the next couple of days to see the year out.  So heres hoping to a cold new year!

The poor number of birds showing in the garden at home at the moment was backed up by the number around the orchard.  In fact it seemed there were less thrushes than before and I caught little today.

Anyway....clear skies early on meant the cooler conditions for frost were good.....

A couple of Song Thrush turned up today with several Redwing.  Both were adults.  Poor old Magpies get the blame for the reduction in numbers of these birds in particular, but the science of ringing and monitoring has shown it is the non-survival of juveniles over their first winter that is to blame.  Some birds seem to always get a bad press...Magpies.....Herring Gulls....Feral Pigeons....I prefer to turn this round and and look at the animal pointing the finger....humans!

This is the second Sparrowhawk in the net at the orchard.  This time a female.....

15th December

A nice start to the session being that it was easy to open the nets....meaning of course its far too warm....so not really that much in the orchard.  After a couple of hours it clouded over and began to rain so I packed it in having caught a few Redwing and a couple of Fieldfare.
Ironically, whilst I was packing up and as the misty rain became more persistent, the largest number of these birds I have seen on site were around....oh well....next time....and....will it ever get cold....!?

December...it must be cold weather...

...or not....a promising start to last week when it was cold became a shambles by the end of the week and when I stepped outside on Saturday morning it was positively mild (werent we promised an arctic blast?)....which usually means very few winter thrushes around as they will all be out in the fields somewhere eating worms....anyway...I went ringing and although it was an early finish some nice birds turned up anyway....

Ive been lucky enough to ring a few Redpolls at the orchard...heres a rather stunning male....

Lesser Redpoll

Male Siskins look fabulous...but this female is equal to the good looks task....

Siskin

Siskin

One of the birds that always has a lot to say for itself....Sturnus vulgaris....there were half a dozen in the net, so it was rather noisy!!....but the purpley, greeney, spotty suit of feathers is a thing of beauty...

Starling

....and heres a female, identified at this time of year by the outer eye ring....

Starling

One of each...

Woodpeckers, that is.....not the complete set and I am not expecting to complete the trio....I have only ever seen one Lesser Spotted Woodpecker in the hand....however, I am not complaining...

These two birds below have completely different attitudes in the net and in the hand.  The Green, larger than the Great Spotted, doesnt complain at either....the Great Spotted however, is one of the noisy birds in the net and in the hand (along with Starling and Jay)....both are fabulous birds to catch....

Green Woodpecker

Green Woodpecker

Green Woodpecker

 ...a fine set of spots....

Great Spotted Woodpecker

Another green bird...stunningly so....

Greenfinch

Greenfinch

Greenfinch

Last for now, if you read my introduction piece about the influence that got me in to ringing here it is...a stunning male blackbird with fine orange/yellow bill and a gorgeous eye ring matching accessory....girls...eat yer hearts out....

Blackbird

And without further ado....

...and stories of how I got in to ringing.....

Winter ringing in orchards is aimed at catching the winter thrushes visiting us.  Obviously a great many turn up along with other species avoiding the cold winter in Europe.  Lucky us!!

First bird out of the net...what a result....Little Owls usually hang around orchards anyway and I have seen them where we have been ringing before but never caught one.....till now...

Little Owl

Second visit.....this juvenile male turned up.

Sparrowhawk

Other birds caught in the first two visits this winter.

Wood Pigeon

Blue Tit

Chaffinch

Redwing

Siskin

Song Thrush

European Blackbirds tend to be scaly looking on the breast....heres a good example...

Blackbird

A man called Reg...

Now...pictures will follow....I promise....but heres a little story...

So I went back to college...maybe a mid-life crisis...having had enough of trying to help people that were, for the most part, bent on sabotage.
I didnt buy a Porsche or a Ferrari...I went back to something I loved - the countryside.
I had this lecturer whose name is Reg Lanaway.  Ive never heard a bad word said about Reg and everyone seems to love the guy.  He must be about 900 years old, as wise as the proverbial owl and spent his life teaching farming, and latterly, birds and small mammal identification.
I was at Plumpton College around the end of the last Century (amazing that we live in times when we, those over 20 I guess, can write that).
Anyway, having been out and about on a few birding trips with Reg, one warm Autumnal day he invites the students (there werent that many of us) to his garden to see some ringing in action.  I had no idea what was about to happen to my life....!
The first thing that happened to my life...was Reg's home brew!!  Now being an 'old boy', all village and no big towns thank you, he had, over the years, become quite an expert brewer of wine.  He had this storage area for the house, I suppose in the old days maybe a boiler room (Victorian/Edwardian house), which he had converted with a few shelves on which sat many demi-johns fizzing, bubbling.  That sunny afternoon, relaxing in comfortable chairs in his garden, three students got tipsy on 'try this one' wine.
The other thing that happened is this....I saw a Blackbird.  Maybe for the first time in my life I actually saw a Blackbird.  Sure, I had seen plenty before then....but I hadnt SEEN one, taken notice of.
Its bright yellowy-orange bill was stonking, fabulous glossy black plummage.  And the one thing that got me in to ringing was....the outstanding yellow eye ring worn by an adult male Blabi.
Reg gave me a phone number of a friend of his, Graeme, who was the nearest ringer to where I lived at the time.
Now...its not often you go out at very early o'cock in the morning, in the dark to meet up with someone, a stranger you have never met before though talked to briefly on the phone.  It seemed like a good idea to me at least.
So, there I was, in the middle of nowhere, though quite near Arlington Stadium actually, with a torch in my hand having a conversation with this Graeme bloke who I have never met.  He has a head torch on - which is beaming in to my eyes so I cant even see anyone in the gloom.
And then something truly magic happened.  A Nightingale sang.  This brown bird, LBJ (Little Brown Job - see Wild at 54 blog) became an icon to me.  THE icon of all birds.  And every year I wait in Spring to hear the Nightingale sing.
So I got to see loads of different birds in the hand....then I learnt to do it all myself....and now I ring them myself (though I still ring with Graeme when I can).
So if anyone asks why I bird ring I give them an edited version of this story.  If anyone asks why is bird ringing done I give them an edited version of this:

http://www.bto.org/volunteer-surveys/ringing/ringing-scheme

The British Trust for Ornithology run everything ringing.  Visit the website and have a read.  It might make your birding in to ringing!!