Exemplary patch working

Local birder Lee Collins writes:

Dawlish Warren is a 1½ mile long sand spit at the mouth of the River Exe in south Devon and is an important roost site for thousands of wintering and passage waterbirds of the Exe Estuary SPA. It has an impressive list of rare vagrants that include- Long-billed Murrelet, Elegant Tern, Short-toed Eagle and Semi-palmated Plover.

However, the patch-workers on site aren't confined to purely finding rare birds; with the benefit of a well positioned hide a dedicated band of regular recorders at Dawlish Warren submit to the BTO and county recorders in excess of 7,000 counts per annum and have developed a growing interest in finding and recording ringed birds in the field. 

With no current ringing on site, all recoveries from recent years have been achieved only by using our optics and a keen eye. In 2014 alone the recording group amassed an incredible 398 reads of 192 individuals, something few sites in the whole of the UK can match.

Recent observations have yielded some important and interesting recoveries with birds ringed from 24 different countries, including Ghana, Mauritania, Greenland, Iceland and Russia, whilst others have had a well-travelled history taking in Namibia and South Africa. 

Common Tern, Dawlish Warren, 29th Aug 2014, darvic ringed at Saltholme, Lee Collins

Notable finds include the first Devon recovery of Little Tern (from Dublin) and the first live Roseate Tern (from Coquet Island, off Northumberland). Common Tern (Saltholme in Teeside & Dublin) and Grey Plover (from Spain & Norway), although common species, hadn't had a Devon recovery in 25 and 50 years respectively. Both the Grey Plovers are notable as being the first Spanish & Norwegian controls of this species in Britain or Ireland, a feat the Recording Group also achieved for a Spanish Spoonbill.

Colour-ringed ‘Sanderblings’ as they've now become known are also a definite highlight and we've recorded 18 in just a few short years. Most have been from ringing schemes from their breeding grounds in Greenland and wintering grounds in West Africa (Ghana & Mauritania), with one of our recoveries also observed in Namibia. This species certainly has a breath-taking migratory pattern.

Sanderling, Dawlish Warren, 20th Jul 2009, Ghanian ringed, Lee Collins

The results of reading rings in the field has also established useful site fidelity and longevity data, in wintering species such as Brent Geese, Shelduck and more specifically Oystercatchers, with five of our Oystercatcher reads being individuals 24 years old or older. One faithful Great Black-backed Gull, from south Cornwall, has to date been read 49 times over a 31 month period on site and another Great Black-backed Gull was seven months from beating the oldest one on record (our Great Black-backed Gull was ringed on the Channel Islands in 1990. Another great gull sighting was the first Lituanian ringed Herring Gull in the UK as well (below).

Herring Gull (Argentatus), Dawlish Warren, 31st Dec 2014, Lithuanian ringed, Lee Collins

Since May 2004, the Dawlish Warren website has been updated daily with latest bird and wildlife news and regularly carries news on the latest recoveries. Annual reports (2013 & 2014) on Warren ring recoveries are available for 2013 and 2014 in pdf format.

Ringed Plover, Dawlish Warren, 4th Oct 2014, Norwegian ringed, Lee Collins

It’s very much hoped that our hard work and dedication in finding and documenting such records can rub off on others, as such endeavours serve a useful cause and can be extremely rewarding.

We’d also like to thank the BTO and various ringers for their invaluable help over the last few years.

Guernsey gull-off

This week North Thames Gull Group (with a few members of West Cornwall Ringing Group) are helping out Guernsey Gulls cannon-netting birds at Chouet Landfill on Guernsey. This is the fifth year the group has visited, and now ringed and colour-ringed 6,500 gulls, including almost 2,000 Lesser Black-backed Gulls. But as it's raining this morning, we thought we'd have a 'gull-off' between the groups. So below are three recent gull stories from the groups, with a fun poll at the bottom to vote on which is best: metal-ringing, colour-ringing or data-loggers.

North Thames Gull Group - GG61151

GG61151 was a first-winter Caspian Gull ringed at Pitsea Landfill, Essex, in 2007, at a time when Caspian Gulls were still just one of the 'yellow-legged' Herring Gulls. Without a colour ring it wasn't seen again until last week when it was found breeding on a rooftop in Minsk, Belarus. This is the first metal ring recovery of a British-ringed Caspian Gull abroad and shows that metal ringing can still be of immense value.

Guernsey Gulls - White 8Z0

Lesser Black-backed Gull White 8Z0 was originally ringed as a breeding adult on Sark in May 2009. After being seen locally over the summer it was then seen at Porto de Lagos Landfill in Portugal on 13th January 2010, then 12 days later it was back on Chouet Landfill on Guernsey and 10 days later on Guidel beach in France. Four days later it was back at Chouet Landfill, seen a further 21 times until the autumn.

It was then a regular at Chouet Landfill, but also back in Portugal in January 2011 and August 2012, but made an extra-long trip to Agadir, Morocco, December 2012.

West Cornwall Ringing Group et al - GPS loggers

The last week has also seen some high-resolution data coming from four GPS data-loggers being worn by urban-nesting Herring Gulls in St Ives, Cornwall. This project is run in conjunction with Finestripe Productions and University of Amsterdam, looking at the behaviour of these birds in a typical seaside town. Tracks from these four birds are fascinating and show how birds are making 90-minute trips out to sea or across the countryside, travelling at up to 40 miles per hour.

Below are the tracks over the last few days of all four birds and then also an animation of the wanderings of one bird, even showing it appearing to follow a ploughing tractor at one point.

doarama.com

So now cast your vote on your favourite marking technique: the 68p metal ring, the £1.60 metal/colour ring combo, or the £900 GPS data-logger...

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