A Bounty of Black Redstarts

Chris did the Derbyhaven/Langness survey today (whilst I was stuck at work!) and he called me to let me know that he had found not one, but four, yes 4 Black Redstarts.
3 were on Fort Island and the fourth was on the rocks above the shore below the Herring Tower on Langness.

In true Blue Peter style - here's one I made earlier (or rather a picture I took a couple of Autumn's ago) of a Black Redstart, cunningly hiding it's red tail, at Ramsey.

Still no ringing taking place due to either work or the weather getting in the way.

Roll on some days off with no wind!

Hen Harrier & Water Rail - Power cable strikes

No ringing or birding this past week due to being busy with work and the bad weather. A new supply of Sunflower Hearts and Nijer seed will hopefully bring some bigger numbers of birds into the garden for when the weather does become suitable for opening the nets though.

On the ringing front, we had a message earlier this week about a female Hen Harrier being recovered freshly dead having hit power lines on a farm near Andreas. It had originally been ringed by ourselves as a pullus (nestling) on 1st July 2008 with ring number FB04434, the only chick that hatched from a clutch of 5 eggs (the other 4 eggs were infertile).

Then today I heard from my Uncle that he had found a dead bird under power lines in his field in the Surby area above Port Erin. On checking the photographs he had taken of it, it turned out to be a Water Rail. It was unringed. Presumably a migrant as the area it was found in is far from typical Water Rail habitat.

Point of Ayre Gravel Pits walk

Chris was leading a Manx Ornithological Society walk around the gravel pits this morning so I tagged along to help him out. It was a well attended event, probably as the site is not open to the public yet, and there have been some cracking records coming from there as a result of the weekly survey carried out by Manx Bird Life.
As soon as I got out of the car at the site I had a flock of at least 250 Redwing flying North, gaining height quickly as they went, there were about 50 or so Fieldfare in with them - great start! Groups of Redwing, Fieldfare and Song Thrush were heard/seen flying over during most of the 2 hours we were on site and probably numbered in excess of 500 in all.
Only about 30 seconds later, still just getting my 'scope out of the boot of the car I heard and then saw a Snow Bunting flying overhead and quickly flying out of site behind the mounds of gravel.
Next onto the list was a Common Snipe coming in from the East, calling. It circled for a short time and then it pointed its long bill down and it plummeted toward one of the old settling pools.
Once we were on site we quickly saw a female Hen Harrier quartering the site, it was seen a further 3 times during the walk around the site, piling into a mixed group of Linnet and Meadow Pipit at one stage.
A Reed Bunting and a couple of Stonechats were in the scrub area to the North of the main pit and Robins, Song Thrush and Dunnock were calling all around us.
Down on the main pit there were a good variety of duck.
Coot, Mallard, Tufted Duck and Pochard made up the bulk of the duck present but were joined by several Goldeneye, 2 drake Scaup, 2 drake Gadwall, 3 female and a drake Shoveler, 8 Teal, c.20 Wigeon and a handful of Cormorant.
A small group of Great Tit and Blue Tit dropped into the willows in front of us at this point, a real rarity on the site and more than likely a "migrant" group.
Five Skylark, several Chaffinch & Goldfinch and a Redpoll were also recorded flying over.
Gulls on site were 15 or so GBB Gulls, several Herring Gull and 2 Common Gulls.
It was a good mornings birding and hopefully showed the group the potential of the site which will eventually be turned into a proper reserve once the aggregate company have finished with it, allowing the general public to enjoy arguably one of the best birding areas on the Island.

Migrant Snipe

My mum tells me that there have been good numbers of Common Snipe flying over Lower Ballafodda this week, all heading South East.
She has also had big numbers up on the moorland at South Barrule, flushing many groups upto 10 strong.
I'll hopefully get a chance to get up there and try to dazzle some soon.

Control Greenfinch

I opened the garden net again this afternoon once the sky started to cloud over a little.
I caught 3 House Sparrow, 3 Blue Tit (2 retraps), 2 Great Tit, a Chaffinch and a Greenfinch (control).
The control Greenfinch "TA68890" was originally caught on the Calf of Man on 12th Sept 2008 as a first year female and had not been caught since.
When caught this afternoon it was just finishing its full Summer moult, the last primary just having a small amount of sheath left at the base.

I've not heard any Redwing passing over here yet, though I see that birders on the Lancashire coast have had good numbers over the last couple of days and there have been several thousand recorded in various localities in the Scottish Northern Isles and East coast of England. I'll hopefully catch up with some soon.

"Manx" Greenshank back in Spain

I received an email today from Raymond Duncan of the Grampian Ringing Group.
They carry out a colour ringing project on Greenshank in Eastern Scotland and last April one of their birds was sighted here at Fort Island. The same bird has been resighted back in Spain a few days ago, details below.

Ring Number: DB51358, Colour rings Yellow/Blue Lime/Blue
Ringed 09 August 2007, Montrose Basin, NE Scotland, Age: Juvenile

Resighted:
25th August 2007, Ria de Foz, Lugo, SPAIN
29th August 2007, Ria de Foz, Lugo, SPAIN
19th September 2007, Ria de Foz, Lugo, SPAIN
9th November 2007, Ria de Ortigueira, A Coruna, SPAIN
17th April 2008, Fort Island, Derbyhaven, Isle of Man
21st June 2008, River Axe, Axmouth, Devon
4th October 2009, Ria de Ortigueira, A Coruna, SPAIN

Many thanks to Raymond for the info, he has previously supplied us with information on 2 colour ringed Waxwings seen in Ramsey last Winter which his team had ringed in Aberdeen!

Teatime garden ringing session

I opened the nets again late afternoon after returning from Langness.

I caught 7 birds in all, 4 Blue Tit (including 1 retrap), 1 Greenfinch, 1 Goldfinch and a Chaffinch.

The retrap Blue Tit was one which I had originally ringed on 14th October 2008 as a first year bird (i.e. hatched Spring 2008).

I then retrapped it inside the nestbox in my garden on 19th May this year, sitting on 5 eggs, and identified it as a female. She succesfully fledged all 5 chicks from the box the last of which left the nest on the 9th June.

I hadn't caught her since then so it's good to see that "Mum" is still around and will hopefully make it through the Winter to raise another brood next Spring!

Langness Survey

Did the Manx Bird life Derbyhaven/Langness survey with Chris today. It turned out to be a belting days birding with a good bit of banter too!

Highlights were an adult Mediterranean Gull amongst the Black-headed Gull flock on the golf links, 2 Greenshank, 7 Light-bellied Brent Geese, 9 Bar-tailed Godwit roosting at Langness, 2 (possibly 3) Little Egrets, Merlin, Peregrine and Water Rail.
The Med Gull was a real craking adult in Winter plumage picked out at about 200m range whilst we were having our mid-survey snack on the bench by the 17th tee. It was feeding well, picking up insects off the ground. It was great to watch one of these smart looking Gulls as they are still quite scarce on the Isle of Man, albeit they are being recorded more often nowadays.
The first Little Egret was seen below the Golflinks house and on getting it in the 'scope it proved to be "B/J", one of the colour ringed first-year birds from North Wales. It, or another, colour ringed bird was roosting with the Oystercatchers at Langness at High Water, however it only had the one leg down and that was the Left leg with the "B" colour ring on so we were unable to confirm whether it was "B/H" or "B/J".
A definitely different Little Egret flew passed us between Sandwick and the Stinking Dubh and landed on the saltmarsh, on checking it through the 'scope it was seen to be unringed.
The Merlin did a close range fly-by twice, scattering the Teal on the Stinking Dubh the first time!
The Peregrine also performed well, doing a high stoop into a flock of about 200 Starling although it looked like it was just playing as it pulled out of the stoop just prior to the flock.
The most unexpected bird of the day though was the Water Rail, heard "squeeling" from somewhere in the saltmarsh below Madoc's memorial.
Migrant wise, there was a decent flock of about 20 House Martins above Derbyhaven, joined by 4 Swallows. Meadow pipits were very numerous with the biggest concentration being around Langness Lighthouse. Robins were "ticking" from seemingly every other coastal gorse bush and a handful of "Alba" Wagtails passed overhead. Skylarks were also passing over in small groups.
In all we had 51 species, not bad considering we were mainly concentrating on the coast for this particular survey!
Another memorable sight today was a group of about 15 HUGE Mullet feeding at the waters surface below the causeway to Fort Island.
After a day like that it reminds me why I enjoy Birding so much!

Garden nets open at last!

The wind and work have conspired to keep me from doing any ringing and birding for almost a week now so, grabbing the chance, I opened the nets for 30 mins this morning.
The feeders have been quiet for a while so I didn't expect to catch much and I only caught a Greenfinch and a House Sparrow before the sun came round and onto the net making it pointless carrying on as the birds could easily see the net.
I'm off Birding for the rest of today so hopefully I'll see something good...