Bearded Tit bails out of Scotland

The Bearded Tit is a very handsome bird and their call can excite many a birder when it's heard 'pinging' across the reedbed. As a Schedule 1 species, Bearded Tits are one of 88 species specially protected in the breeding season. Between 800-1,000 Bearded Tits are ringed every year in Britain by qualified bird ringers. Being fairly sedentary they make a good study species, particularly for the Retrapping Adults for Survival scheme (of which there are currently three active projects), but they can be frustrating as groups of Bearded Tits are occasionally prone to flying straight up into the air and disappearing into the distance.

Male Bearded Tit. Photo by Graham Catley

The map below shows some of the movements of Bearded Tits that have been recorded within our Ringing Scheme. As you can see, the majority of movements are from their stronghold in East Anglia to the near continent.


Colour of location: Ringed in Britain and Ireland, Found Here; Ringed Here, Found in Britain and Ireland

We have just heard from our colleagues in the Norwegian Ringing Scheme that one of their ringers has recently (16 Oct 2018) caught a Bearded Tit wearing a BTO ring! This is only the second recorded movement of a BTO-ringed Bearded Tit to Norway.

This bird was ringed as a juvenile by the Tay Ringing Group on 24 June 2018 at one of their regular sites and reported from Norway less than four months later. It is likely this bird would have been travelling in the opposite direction to the thousands of other species that would have been leaving Scandinavia on their way to spend the winter with us.

The map below shows the ringing and finding locations of some of the Bearded Tits ringed by the Tay Ringing Group; the bird reported from Norway was the Group's longest-distance movements to date for this species. The red pins show the ringing location and the blue pins the finding location.

For more information of the movements of Bearded Tits and some interesting recoveries, check out the BTO Online Ringing & Nest Recording Report.

Migratory Moorhen?

BTO volunteer, Lawrence Potter writes:

"Whilst doing our monthly BTO WeBS count at Woodbridge, Suffolk, I noticed a moorhen feeding on the river alongside a pontoon as it looked to have a coloured ring. I asked my colleague (Robert Johnson) to have a look with his telescope and after about 10 mins of observation we got details on the ring; AE32. We were both intrigued with who was colour ringing Moorhen, wondering where it had been ringed, so we submitted it and the results were amazing!

The ringer, Carsten Lome writes:

We started colour ringing Moorhen and Coot in Norway in spring 2013. So far 104 moorhens have been ringed, 54 of them ringed this year. Nearly all have been caught in three cities; Oslo, Bergen and Stavanger. All of the birds in Oslo migrate, so are ringed during the summer only. The majority of the Moorhen in the other two locations are mostly caught during the winter. There have been a few movements between Bergen and Oslo, although how they tackle the mountains in between is unknown. We've also had one bird ringed in Bergen and found in Stockholm.

AE32 was ringed as a breeding bird in Oslo in July this year. Interestingly its partner was ringed last winter in the city centre of Bergen (300 km from Oslo)! Unfortuately they have exactly the same wing length, so sexing them is currently not possible. This pair had three young in their first brood and only two in the second brood, which had not fledged by the last time we visited this pond on 11 October but hopefully did so soon after.



For a species that is thought to be fairly resident, we have had three BTO ringed Moorhen found in Norway but this was the first Norway ringed Moorhen to be reported in Britain or Ireland. This is a distance of 1042 km in 120 days.

Colour of location: Purple - Originally ringed in Britain & Ireland; Orange - Found in Britain & Ireland

For more information on the WeBS counts for Moorhen click here.

There are colour ringing projects all over the country that need your sightings. In Suffolk alone there are Redshank, Black-tailed Godwit, House Sparrow, Herring and Lesser Black-backed Gull, Kittiwake, Peregrine and Mute Swan to name a few. A list of projects can be viewed at European Colour-ring Birding.

Bumper Little Stint year

With a latin name meaning a small grey waterside bird, the Little Stint is a gem among waders, especially in its breeding plumage.

We have had very few recoveries of this species in the history of the ringing scheme but things are now picking up. Up to 2011 we have had only had 16 reports of Little Stint ringed abroad and found in the UK and Ireland. Of these the majority (11 birds) were ringed in Norway, these were reported in the 1940s (1), 1960s (1), 1970s (2), 1980s (4), 1990's (2), 2000s (1).

Little Stint feeding - Dave Crawshaw

Due to a new colour ringing project in Norway, we have had a grand total of 7 sightings this year! Mike Marsh has let us know that he saw a group of 5 Little Stint at Orfordness, Suffolk. One of these was colour ringed and stayed around for a couple of days.This bird had only been ringed a mere 14 days previously and covered a distance of 1188km.

Little Stint winter in Africa, around the Indian Ocean and as far south as South Africa. There are also variable numbers in the Mediterranean and Persian Gulf, so it had a little further to go.


View Little Stint in a larger map

Thanks to Mike Marsh for letting us know.

Norwegian Blue Tit update!

We have just heard from our colleagues of the Norwegian Ringing Scheme with an update of the Blue Tit wearing a Norwegian ring that was previously posted.

The first-year Blue Tit was ringed at Lista Bird Observatory, Farsund, Vest-Agder (58'06N, 06'34E) on October 5th. This bird was then caught 9 days later in Lerwick fit and well.


View NOS Blue Tit in a larger map

Alf Tore Mjös writes:
2012 has been another “big year” for Blue Tits in Scandinavia. Many have left the coastline and turned up on the remote island of Utsira 20 km off the west coast, including quite a few ringed at Lista Bird Observatory and Revtangen Bird Observatory. The usual movement of Blue Tits in southern Norway is along the coast from east towards west and then northwest to north.

Fair Isle Bird Observatory has also reported a Blue Tit in a garden while hoping for a Rubythroat. The warden writes on their blog "The last Fair Isle record of a Blue Tit was back on 1st January 1989, there have actually been 3 Rubythroats (including this years) on the island since this commonplace UK garden resident."

Thanks again for David Okill for letting us know and our colleagues in Norway.

Norwegian ringed Blue Tit in Shetland

Dave Okill writes:

Autumn in Shetland brings falls of continental migrants on south-easterly winds and the end of the second week in October 2012 brought large numbers of Redwings with smaller numbers of Goldcrests, Blackbirds and Bramblings into the Isles. Reports of more uncommon birds were scattered over the next few days and included Olive-backed Pipits into double figures, a Treecreeper and unbelievably a Lesser Spotted Woodpecker, Scotland's first authenticated record.

On the 14th October, an Olive-backed Pipit and a Great Tit were found in a mature wooded garden on the edge of Lerwick. These were joined on the 16th by a Blue Tit which was seen to be ringed with a 'chunky' silver ring. Permission was obtained by members of the Shetland Ringing Group and on the next day the Great Tit and Blue Tit were caught. The ring on the Blue Tit proved to be from the Norwegian ringing scheme.

Blue Tits are very scarce late autumn migrants in the Northern Isles and they do occasionally over winter; in the exceptional year of 1988 at least 40 were recorded but in many years there are no reports, so a ringed bird in the Northern Isles is very unusual.

There have been a number of previous ringing recoveries of Blue Tits to and from the continent but
these have nearly all been from south-east England especially along the channel coast. There have
been 9 foreign birds recovered in England and 10 British ringed birds recovered abroad. The single
Blue Tit recovered from Norway was at Felixstowe, Suffolk. It is possible that some of these birds
moving across the channel could have been ship assisted, but difficult to prove.

We await the ringing details from Norway with interest.

Thanks to Ray Johnston for the photo

Dipper in Essex

Continental Black-bellied Dippers are recorded most years on the islands in the north of Scotland and on the east coast of the UK. However, ringing recoveries have been surprisingly lacking in the origin of these migratory Dippers that visit the UK in the winter.

More than 1900 Dippers were ringed under the BTO ringing scheme during 2010, most of them ringed as chicks (1700). Encounters of ringed adults are rather low, outside of special projects and recoveries of foreign ringed birds are very unusual.

So we were quite surprised when we had a phone call about a Dipper from Norway! This is the fourth ever recovery of a Dipper with a foreign ring found in the UK and this bird was unfortunately attacked by a cat near Colchester, Essex.

We don't know yet where in Norway this bird came from but previously we have had three other movements of Dippers between the British Isles and Scandinavia, as the map below illustrates.

The one in Purple was ringed as a chick on 22 May 2004 near Bergen and later controlled by ringers in Voe (Shetland Mainland) on the 2 Feb 2006. The one in yellow was ringed as a chick north of Kristiandsand (south Norway) on the 31 May 1993 and later found killed by car the 28 Oct 1993. The one in red was ringed as an adult on 4 Mar 1985 in Orkelljunga (south Sweden) and controlled by a ringer two years later in Crail (Fife Region) on 3 Apr 1987.

View The Only Way is Essex in a larger map

Thanks to Jon Evans for the photograph of the Black-bellied Dipper.

Goldcrest wins Gold Medal

The last batch of recoveries received from the Norwegian ringing scheme included some birds that had been seen during the autumn in the UK. It is always nice to see where migrating Dunnocks, Robins and Blackbirds have come from. However, there was one record in particular that grabbed my attention:

Goldcrest, ring number NOS - LE5877. This tiny bird crossed the North Sea from Ana Sira, Sokndal, Norway, to North Somercoates, Lincolnshire, in just TWO DAYS.

Goldcrests often invade the east coast of Britain during the autumn, before the winter teperatures plummet, and this is just one of the many reports of Goldcrests we receive during this time. Studies have shown that Goldcrests are capable of moving long distances in a very short period of time. Despite their small size, they are able to efficiently accumulate fat reserves, and by covering the largest distances at night, when the temperature is lower, are able to maximise their energy reserves.

Weighing around 6g, Goldcrest NOS - LE5877, flew 665km during its two day migration. This remarkable journey sparked our curiosity and led us to investigate a little further into the depths of the ringing database to see just how fast this Goldcrest was.

Below are the results, and, "Bingo!", NOS - LE5877 wins the gold medal.

The graph below shows the maximum distance travelled in two days by Goldcrests. Distances are in km's.

Blaumeise the Blue Tit visits the UK

You never know what you might find in your own garden, as demonstrated by Mr Skehens from Gloucestershire who found a Blue Tit in his garden that had recently died. Nothing ground breaking there, due to their short life span and sedentary nature, but this ring had the magic words "Helgoland Germania" inscribed on it!

We have somewhere in the region of 22,800 reports of Blue Tit either found dead or moving more than 5km, but only 170 of these have moved more than 100km. This bird had travelled a massive 737km across the sea but unfortunately this bird is not the record holder. This remains as a Norweigan Blue Tit that was caught in Suffolk by Landguard Ringing Group (782km).


The red pointer is the German Blue Tit, while the Blue pointer is the Norweign Blue Tit.
View Blue Tit in a larger map

Thanks to Jill Pakenham for the photo

Hawfinch prolific

The Hawfinch "catching season" is short - late March to early May. I have been very pleased with my efforts over the last 7 years and some 200 birds ringed, but this season has been really exceptional. With the help of Adrian Thomas and Rob Husbands, the three of us have managed to catch Hawfinch at seven different feeding sites in the Forest of Dean and lower Wye Valley.

In total 228 birds ringed, 37 recaptured from previous years, 74 same season retraps and 1 foreign control (from Norway). Because of the number of sites in operation this year, we have had our first same season movements, showing that a proportion of the population is very mobile in the month leading up to breeding, with movements of up to 20 km. One such bird, ringed on 26th March was photographed by Lewis Thompson 10 km away on 6th April.

Posted on behalf of Jerry Lewis, Photo by Lewis Thomson

Suffolk Marsh Warbler that almost got away

It took five years to make it through the process, changed identity a couple of times, but the second foreign-ringed Marsh Warbler to be found in Britain has finally come to light.


When a slightly odd-looking Reed Warbler wearing a Norwegian ring was caught on the Suffolk coast in August 2004, no one at the time realised its true identity.


After a fair bit of investigation across the North Sea in Norway, this bird was actually pinned down as a Marsh Warbler. This could also be confirmed retrospectively from photos taken of the bird at the time, which have come to light recently (above). It was actually ringed as a young bird in Norway in July 2004, caught on autumn passage.

We have very few international movements of ringed Marsh Warblers, but the map below nicely shows where birds are coming from on migration, and where our birds are heading in the autumn. Green markers show the movement of the bird mentioned above, with blue markers showing where British-ringed birds have been found and red markers showing where birds found in Britain originated.


View Marsh Warbler in a larger map

Thanks to the ringers in Suffolk (who shall remain anonymous) for sorting this out and letting us know about the cock-up.