Ringing 13-18 August

Post date: Aug 18, 2012 6:14:34 PM

During this week I carried out four ringing sessions, the last of which was open to the general public within the program "Ciência Viva de Verão". The week started really well, with the capture of another acrola (fourth of the year), as well as the first Bonelli's Warbler (Phylloscopus bonelli) for the site, the control of a Reed Warbler (Acrocephalus scirpaceus) with a British ring and the capture of a young male Sparrowhawk (Accipiter nisus)!

The following session, however, was very poor with only 14 birds caught. This was probably caused the two days of southerly wind and the heavy rain on the previous night, which halted bird migration. LPS, who visited me on that day, was very unfortunate; but the numbers got quite high just after the bad weather period, with 76 birds caught on friday, including the first Pied Flycatcher (Ficedula hypoleuca) of the season, 6 Melodious Warblers (Hippolais polyglotta), 3 Grasshopper Warblers (Locustella naevia) and many more (17 species in total).

Today's session for "Ciência Viva", in which I was helped by PQT and SM, was also pretty good despite using a lower number of nets. The highlight was probably the four Grasshopper Warblers caught, one of which had a fat score of 6 and weighed 19.8 g!! (Lean mass is about 11 g.)

The ringing totals for this period are the following (retraps between parenthesis):

Accipiter nisus 1

Acrocephalus arundinaceus 2

Acrocephalus paludicola 1

Acrocephalus schoenobaenus 8

Acrocephalus scirpaceus 51 (11, one of which from Britain)

Alcedo atthis 2

Caprimulgus europaeus 1

Cettia cetti (1)

Cisticola juncidis 1

Euplectes afer 20 (4)

Ficedula hypoleuca 2

Hippolais polyglotta 9

Hirundo rustica 13

Locustella luscinioides 9 (3)

Locustella naevia 7

Luscinia megarhynchus 1 (1)

Parus caeruleus 1

Parus major 2 (2)

Passer domesticus 2

Passer montanus 2

Phylloscopus bonelli 1

Phylloscopus ibericus 1 (1)

Phylloscopus trochilus 5 (1)

Riparia riparia 1

Saxicola torquatus 2 (1)

Sylvia atricapilla 3 (4)

Troglodytes troglodytes 1 (1)

Turdus merula 1 (1)

Lets hope next week will be even better!

Cheers

JMN