Hi all sorry I've not been on line since 2015 I'm hoping to get back into this and keep posting new posts about the Channel Islands ringing scheme and my own sites as many of you are aware  in 2016 
Alderney the third largest of the Channel Islands created the new Alderney bird observatory this year it was finally given its full accreditation as the 21st bird observatory within the British Isles since opening the observatory has managed to many thousands of birds and shown that Alderney is one of the major migration routes from bird migration not only into the UK but  Northern  Europe this makes Alderney
one of the most important migration route within the Channel Island.

With my own ringing in Guernsey over the last couple of years Spring migration has been this affair and this year has been no exception with a very late spring migration  a visit to the claire mare reed beds last night i only managed to hear one male reed warbler singing usually by this time there are several males singing within the reed bed yet there are still quite a good number of Sand Martins going through  as we usually record our last ones going through by the end of April On the last spring tide in April beginning of May I took a trip across to lihou island to check on the cormorants that nest on Lihoumel this year out of the 22 nests there is only three which hatching's the rest was still  sitting on eggs at the same time last year I was struggling to keep the young cormorants from scrambling over the rocks  I estimate that they are about 10 to 14 days later than what they were last year this is another indication of a very late spring

A good start on Sunday at my ringing site at Jerbourg with two nets open 18 metre and a 12 m I started cutting and clearing some more of the net rides but gave up after the first round with a good number of birds in the netting area and with good numbers of swallows migrating through and swooping round the nets after insects . I ended up with a total of 54 new birds which included 9 Black Caps 2 Firecrest 1 house sparrow 1  chiffchaff  41  swallows a good number with only two nets open and only given a pass for three hours by the boss indoors had to get home to look after the kids . So she could go to work going to have to get this sorted?

With eight weeks of ringing at the Claire Mare reedbeds over it is now time to move the nets to Jerboug for the rest of the autumn ringing season though sedge warbler's were in quite good numbers this year I noticed a higher percentage of adults too juvenile reed warbler's were very disappointing with numbers declining each year it is a worrying trend nearly all the reed warbler's that were caught were possibly migrants migration back South as I only ring 3 that I coded 3J so it makes me wonder whether we're going to lose reed warbler as a breeding species at this reed bed . We really do need to look at what is going on . Best of birds caught at the Clair Mare was aquatic warbler melodious warbler and two kingfishers. Fingers crossed for the weather to be kind to me this year at Jerboug as the last couple years has been washout with the weather.

Aquatic warbler on the left sedge warbler on the right  

melodious warblerAdd caption

Kingfisher

   

With a poor start to the spring ringing season it did not get much better with clear nights most migrants passed straight overhead though we did managed to catch and ring some migrants as always spring is very hit and miss  in Guernsey the best bird of spring migration was a golden oriel a new ringing tick for me I did spend a couple of days in Alderney at the latter end of spring migration one interesting part was one evening catching swallows on the migration North I managed to catch  several juvenile swallows it was too early for these to be from the local breeding population I believe that these birds are from breeding swallows in southern Europe and joining up with swallows migrating north. In May  we started the seabird season  starting with   a week at our local tip with the North Thames Gull group this is something that we have been doing for several years now organised by Paul varon who's been doing a colouring project with our local breeding population of gull for several years the target species being lesser black backed gulls though we colouring all gull species which has been a great success with so much more being learnt about the movement of gulls and is now giving us a greater understanding of these great birds and their life the general seabird ringing this year it was quite a good season though we did not manage to get out as much as I would like to do we managed to colouring a good sample of greater cormorants and the small sample of shags with the shags showing a better breeding season than last year in July a small group of us went up to Burhou for two nights of ringing storm petrels again this trip proved to be a great success with 389 new birds ring and a total of 114 re-traps 

After a long mild winter , I was hoping that the spring migration would be somewhat better, but with clear nights . A lot of our migration is going overhead with only a scattering of birds making landfall though it seems migration has been very slow this year with birds being held up in Africa and southern Europe due to weather conditions. We can only hope that the next couple weeks get better . It has been that slow that I'm not even tried for swallows of an evening I was hoping to get up to Alderney this weekend with the winds all week being a light force 1 to 2 and from the south the south-east but as always the forecast changes to the weekend with northerly winds predicted 5 to 6 will have to cancel my trip fingers crossed for next weekend but hey no a more cheerful note we did manage today to get up to the humps with the help of  the Guernsey Sea fisheries, who took a team of four of us to Godin, we left St Peter Port harbour at about 8.50 and headed to the humps on the way up . We passed jethou and Herm
we managed to count at least 18 puffins on the water. As we got closer to the humps. There is also a good number of guillemots rafting nearby. After about 20 min. We held just of Godin on the Leopard S the sea fisheries boat while they launched the rip myself. Paul Catherine and Vic were put ashore once ashore, we had a small discussion on how to approach the cormorants as this some of the chicks were quite big, it was decided that we would take one nest at a time and and tried to round the bigger chicks back towards the nests. This seem to work well as we approach each nest and with keeping the birds tight to each other. We would place a blanket over four or five birds. This is the first time we have used this method and it definitely helps keep the birds calm while I metal ring and Paul putting the colour rings on. We moved slowly through the nesting site keeping a tight ring round the birds as yet I do not have the exact number of birds that we managed to ring as Catherine was taking the ring numbers and the colouring as myself and Paul rung the birds Vic had brought some slate and some broken patio slabs with him so that we could try to give the common terms chicks somewhere to hide and give them some protection from the gulls after last year. Fingers crossed they return

   Once again it's been a mixed autumn migration with a good start to the early part of migration at the reed bed with good numbers of reed warbler  and sedge warblers rung  I moved the nets to my ringing site at Jerbourg for the last two weeks of September and the first two weeks of October were showing promising signs of a good autumn migration with good numbers of black cap chiffchaff willow warblers grasshopper warblers and many other migrants but once again the weather turned against me with hardly anything rung down towards the end of October and the first week of November I have managed to get out for a couple of hours over the last three weeks I have managed to catch and ring, a few birds mainly blackbirds song thrush and my first redwing of the year today hoping tomorrow will be a better day . But with the weather still being quite mild . We have not seen a big  movement of winter thrushes yet there was a good number of finches in the field today, but with quite a strong breeze and bright sunshine at times they were not playing ball  number of birds rung in October for the last five years in  2010 /84 birds were rung  2011/ 91 birds rung 2012 /132 birds rung 2013/30 birds rung in 2013 . The weather turned bad early with heavy rain and strong winds I only managed to ring twice that year and did not go back until the spring 2014/127 birds rung

GOLDFINCH

BLACKBIRD

REDWING

SONG THRUSH

CHAFFINCH

REDWING

  

After eight weeks in the reed bed at the Clare Mare we took the nets down on the 07/09/14 since I took over ringing at the reed bed from Jamie. This year has been my best so far. Sedge warbler this year are well up. With 297 new birds being rung with over 70% of them being juvenile birds, reed warbler are slightly up as well this year, along with willow warbler after having four aquatic warbler in 2013. It was a bit disappointing only catching one this year, but never mind  always  next year. Over the last five years sedge and reed have been up and down in numbers showing that weather conditions play an important part to the success in the rearing and success of breeding birds .In 2010 being a reasonable spring and summer. We managed to ring 141 sedge warbler and147 reed warbler, 2011 rung 169 sedge warbler 81 reed warbler, In 2012, with a very cold and wet spring and summer sedge warbler's and reed warbler were well down with only 63, Sedge and 71 reed warbler being rung with that conditions in 2013 being better sedge and reed warbler were up. with 190 sedge reed 115 rung 2014 has been an excellent year with 297.sedge Rung and 103 reed warbler being rung it seems to me that reed warbler are still struggling as reed warbler used to outnumber sedge warbler. On 14 September. I moved back to my ringing site up at Jerbourg,after the disappointment of last year with constant winds this year has proven to be a good year specially for Black Caps and grasshopper warbler. On 2 October, I caught a black cap a controlled bird that had a Museum of Brussels ring on it.

SEDGE WARBLER

BLACK CAP

A good couple weeks ringing down the reed bed spending a few hours in the morning before work and a couple of hours of the night most days  I have managed to trap and ring 380 new birds mainly all sedge surprise bird was aquatic warbler trapped and rung on the second of August a very early bird to the reed bed as we usually hope to catch these in the middle half of August with what has been rung so far this year it seems like a good breeding year of many species, birds rung so far this month are as 176 Sedge 53 reed 27 willow warbler 115 swallows 1 aquatic warbler 2 blackbirds 1 Wren 1 Robin 2 dunnock 2 black cap

Aquatic warbler
02/08/2014

 

We finished our seabird monitoring on a high with the storm petrels on Burhou on the night of 19th and 20th with 350 new storm petrels rung and 92 control re-traps it was a great weekend but this is only part of the story  once again many seabirds failed this breeding season this is due to many factors from the winter storms to loss of habitat but the biggest threat to our seabird at the moment is the brown rat on many of our offshore islets and human disturbance but on a brighter note I am now back down the reedbeds at the Clare Mare with eight nets up in the reedbeds and has been a good start to the autumn season spending two or three hours ringing in the morning before work over the last couple of days I have managed to to ring so far 92 swallows 36 sedge warbler 27 Reed warbler 15 willow warbler 1 Robin 3 wrens and one dunnock hoping the weather stays good week i would like to thank Phil and Paul for their help with the storm petrels and a big thanks to the Alderney wildlife trust and the states of Alderney for allowing us to ring on Burhou one of the most important seabird breeding grounds within the Bailiwick of Guernsey and Channel Islands.

sedge warbler

Robin

 

I spent this weekend cutting rides out down the claire mare reed beds start ringing when we get back from Alderney next weekend from doing storm petrels the last of our seabird monitoring this year while down the Claire mare I put up one 60 Mist net mainly for swallows managed to ring 30 swallows and to reed warblers and one controlled reed warbler that I rung on 30 July 2012 as an adult male hoping to go back Wednesday evening to do some more swallows whether permitting


swallows

After a very successful Canon netting week with the North Thames gull group and the Guernsey seabird ringing group at our local tip with over 1000 new gulls rung to which over 300 were lesser black back gulls Paul Veron target species. It was now time to start our seabird ringing and monitoring around the Bailiwick of Guernsey this year is being a year of mixed fortunes. We are now about midway through the seabird season. Our first trip was up to the humps North of herm to visit Godin and Longue Pierre to ring cormorants which was quite successful once again this year we have managed to ring about 40 cormorants with metal rings and colour coded rings this year on two of our main breeding colonies the largest being on Longue Pierre with about 25 breeding pairs and Lihoumel with about 14 breeding pairs. Our first visit to jethou and two islets on 16 June two ring shag  little egrets and early gull chicks was of mixed fortunes with most of the nests empty on both shag and gulls it was not hard to see that there was a problem on  the two islets and Jethou we only managed to ring 22 shag and a handful of gulls it looks like the biggest threat to our seabirds is the brown rat as we noticed a lot of rat workings and even saw two or three rats scurrying through the undergrowth though the shag numbers have been dwindling over the last few years has this been the problem all along total of seabirds round so far this year not counting gulls is 40 cormorants 69 shag nine guillemot though the egrets heve bred well no Crevichon we were too late to ring any there was about 30+ young birds on top of the brushes all fledged and took to the wing as we approached

With the weather not being very good this winter with heavy rain and strong winds I have not managed to do much bird ringing this year so far but with improving weather over the last couple of weeks I have managed a couple of sessions ringing up at Jerbourg and one weekend in Alderney. With the total of birds rung this spring being  hundred and six and 13 guillemot and one gannet at the GS PCA with the spring  nearly over I'm hoping to get two or three more sessions up at Jerbourg the the best bird of the year so far was a Nightingale trapped and rung in Alderney on the 22/04/14 the total of birds rung is as follows out the GS PCA one gannet 13 guillemot one sand Marton 18 swallows one house Marton five wren 4 dunnock 1 Nightingale 4 blackbirds 2 song thrush 6 white throat 29 Black cap 12 chiffchaff 8 willow warbler 1 blue tit 2 great tit 2 green finch 2 gold finch with the seabird season just about to start myself and Paul and Catherine took a trip to lihoumel to look at cormorants for colour ringing but the young birds were not ready yet so we are looking to go back in about two weeks time. On 18 May we will be doing  are seasonal Canon netting of gulls at the tip with the North Thames gull group.

After a poor end to 2013 and a very poor start to 2014 with strong winds and heavy rain, I have not done any ringing apart from 4 Guillemot at the GSPCA this year, Iam looking forward to get some nets up this weekend at Jerbourg with the winds from the south to south-east force 2-3. Iam  sure Colette my partner will have the flags out and a bottle of wine open, As she has come close to kicking me out with me being home at the weekends or getting home before 10am, With the late spring of last year when it finaly arrived most migrants whent straight over the top us because of clear nights ringing was nearly at a stand still with not meny birds grounded and with Colette being taken ill we did not do much sea-bird ringing but it seemed like the autunm migration would be good when i move down to the Claire mare reed beds and started catching a good number of Sedge and reed warbler,with the best of the reed birds being 3 aquatic warblers then the weather turned bad when i moved back up to Jerbourg from about September till the end of the year I think i managed about 6 days of ringing.  The totals for 2013 are as follows,  Shags 2  Marsh Harrier 2  Kestrels  2  Common Sandpiper  1  Herring Gull  1    Barn Owl   3  Sand Martins  3  Swallows  170   Meadow pipit  1   Wren  19   Hedge Accentor  31 Robins  13  Whinchat  2  Blackbirds  26  Song thursh  12   Redwings  13  Grasshopper Warbler  1    Sedge   Warbler  190  Siskin  1  Aquatic  Warbler  3  Reed Warbler  115   Whitethoat  2  Blackcap  20  Chiffchaff   40   Willow Warbler  43   Goldcrest   3   Firecrest   6    Pied Flycatcher  1   Long tailed tit  4  Blue tit  6   Magpie  5   Crows  4  Chaffinch  3   Greenfinch 14  Goldfinch   7   Linnets  16  Great tit  13  Short toet treecreeper  2 

After a dissapointing week with some body stealing the crop of wildbird seed in the field at Jerbourg
myself and Phill went to a new ringing site yesterday after setting up 3 nets we had a good couple of hours trapping and ringing 10 Blackbirds   witch were mainly   of conternental race   5 Song thrush   5 Great tit   2 Goldcrest   1 Firecrest    1 Wren    3 Black cap   1 Dunnock   it turned out to be quiet a good morning fingers crossed  for the weather to stay good meny thanks to the land owner who allowed us to ring on their property here are a couple of photos from yesterday  Black cap  and Great tit

It was a late night with a early morning i was watching the disapointing start to England ashs tour
with not a lot of sleep I met Paul Veron and Phill at Pauls house at 7.15 am hopefully to catch some Gulls when I got there the trap had already been baited. With some Gulls flying around we sat down with a cup of tea and a chat whilst waiting to see weather the Gulls were going to play ball.  Id only just started my cup of tea and looked out at the trap the trap was already full of Gulls so the tea had to wait we only took one catch but it was well worth it with a total of 126 Herring Gulls    to witch  76 
were first year birds  25 adults the others were either re-traps  or second or third winter birds meny thanks to Paul for aranging  the ringing session

It was great to get out this weekend to do some ringing, With the winds N/E 2/3 we whent up to Jerbourg at 7.00 and put up three 60ft net mists, although there was not much on the ground there was some good visible migration with redwing ,fieldfare and a few skylarks going out to sea and 200+ starlings coming in off the sea it was good to be out after several weeks of wind and rain Colette my partner put out the flags and had a party that I was out from under her feet .We did manage to catch
12 redwing       2 wrens      1 great tit      7 dunnock      1 firecrest       1 black bird       and   1 linnet
fingers crossed the weather improves.

After a great week away at Paul Ropers we arrived on friday Paul picked us up from Stanstead airport
and drove up to Pauls house on the Saturday morning it was an early start to get to the tip for some
cannon netting of Gulls we met the rest of the team at the tip we took three small catches of Gulls
including Black headded Greater black back Herring gulls with a couple of Lesser black backs and
one yellow legged gull  it was a good morning ringing
on the Sunday evening Paul, Mich , Cris and myself went to set up some mist nets on farm land
after the nets were up we spent a couple hours trying for a Tawny owl with no success we closed the
nets up and went back to Pauls 6am the next morning we set off to the ringing site and opened up the nets just before dawn hoping to catch Yellowhamer there were plenty of Yellowhamer in the hedge row we seemed to catch every thing else but Yellowhamer we had one net set up at a in filled
quarry in between two fields set up for Sky larks or Meadow pippets near the end of the mornings ringing we were taking down the nets Paul went to take the net down and came back with 10 Yellowhamers  .   With a trip to Northfolk and to Rye Meads it turned out to be a great week away  with many thanks to Paul and hie partner Lorraine for putting up with us all thanks again some pictures of Yellowhamer and a Teal we rung at Rye Meads

Jerbourg has started off very slow this autum with only a hand full of birds being rung
there was good movement of Swallows a week or 2 ago but I could not find any roosts
in the maze I must have covered the whole of the island looking with the winds being in
the eastly quarter and the weather being good i think most of the Swallows and early migrants
went straight through hopefully I will have a good week with the North thames Gull group
this coming week my self and Mich leave Friday for a week of ringing / birding and not
to be unsocible a drink or two

With August over it is proving  to be a good year for ringing in the reed beds at the Claire mare
with Sedge and Reed warblers being well up in numbers from last year I am hoping to continue to
carry on ringing at the Claire mare for another 2 weeks as with the sea bird season being late I
think that the land birds can be late as well  August totals are as follows
Commonn sandpiper   1 ,     Sand martin  1 ,  Swallows 164  ,Wrens 6   ,  Meadow pippit  1
Hedge accentor  6  ,   Robin  2  ,   Whinchat  1  ,   Blackbirds   5  ,  Song thrush  2  ,   Whitethroat   2
Black cap   2  ,  Reed warbler  92  ,  Sedge warbler 186  ,  Aquatic warbler  3  ,  Chiffchaff  8  ,
Willow warbler  25 ,  Pied flycatcher  1   ,  Green finch  6  ,  Gold finch  6  ,
many thanks to the two trainees  Mich and Phill

When to claire mare at 6.00 and met Mich and opened the nets in the reed beds
With the reed wet and thick fog the open mets kept getting water droplets forming on them
keeping them visible to the birds. we only managed to catch a few birds and closed up
by 8am, The best bird of the day was a ringing tick for Mich a common sand piper