23/04/12 - They’re back!

Following the appearance of the first two returning Whimbrel at the Wheldrake roost on Wednesday evening (and with the bird information services showing a few more scattered around the country), Craig visited the feeding fields around Storwood on Friday evening (20^th) after work.

Arriving at the favoured field, three birds were present and rather amazingly, all three were colour-ringed - two from 2009 and one from 2006! How nice it is to find these old returning ‘friends’ and how amazing it is, having travelled approximately 16,000 Km since they were last here, to appear in exactly the same feeding field. Below are the full histories for the three birds:


Whimbrel (EL49641): Orange - Yellow/Yellow 


2006 - Ringed on 23^rd April, followed by regular sightings until 2^nd May.
2009 - Re-sighted by DT on 20^th April, followed by three more sightings from PR until 25^th April.

2010 - Re-sighted by PR 19^th April (afternoon) then caught at the roost - fitted with a radio tag - last signal/sighting on 27^th April.

2011 - Re-sighted by CR/DT on 20^th April, followed by three more sightings from PR until 29^th April.

2012 - Re-sighted on Friday (20^th April) - 16,000 Km round trip to get back to the same field on either 19^th or 20^th April this year. Note whilst ringed on 23^rd April 2006 it may have arrived on 19^th or 20^th, it also shows no lasting effect on the bird from radio tagging.

Whimbrel (EL49892): Yellow - Lime/Lime 


2009 - Ringed on 29^th April, not reported again.

2010 - Re-sighted by PR 19^th April (afternoon) then caught at the roost - fitted with radio tag, last signal/sighting on 30^th April. 

2011 - Re-sighted by PR on 24^th April, followed by five more sightings until 29^th April.  

2012 - Re-sighted on 20^th April.

Whimbrel (EL49888): Yellow - Red/Red

2009 - Ringed on 29^th April, not reported again.

2012 - Re-sighted on 20^th April.


The bird ringed in 2006 may well have clocked up to 96,000 Km since we originally caught him! Impressive stuff! There was no time to check for any other birds in other fields as they flew off for the roost site at Wheldrake Ings at 8.05pm - still, what a start!

Keep an eye out for our coloured feathered friends!

 

20/04/12 - Purple patch

Well, it's more of a rustic brown really - or according to the 'Identification Guide to European Non-Passerines' - maroon/chestnut. Purple patch is actually more of a reference to 'a period of notable success or good luck' as the saying goes! Either way, it's the colouration of the median coverts of a male Gadwall's wing, a truly beautiful duck and often under-rated amongst British waterfowl. 

This week we closed down one of the duck traps as now can often be a good time for catching ‘bored’ males as most of the females are incubating clutches and don’t visit the traps. The traps are only run for a day or two at a go and are checked more regularly throughout the day in order as to not interrupt breeding activities. So it was a nice surprise to find (in addition to 3 Moorhens and a Mallard), four male Gadwall! Unfortunately no camera was handy but here are a couple of photographs taken on a Blackberry!

Adult male Gadwall

Up to the end of 2011 we had ringed 215 Gadwall in the Lower Derwent Valley NNR, over 200 of those being ducklings (photo from last year below). We’ve seldom caught adults, one or two have been caught in the whoosh nets over the years and the odd one has found its way into the duck traps, largely during the early autumn. This is our largest single catch of adult Gadwall ever - and of presumed local breeder status too. Only 110 adult Gadwall were ringed in Britain in 2011 so that’s nearly 4% of the total in one go - a useful addition.

 Gadwall - North Duffield Top Pond - 01/08/11

It was also a case of the 'Ings at its best' on Wednesday evening, with 196 islandica Black-tailed Godwits newly arrived (the biggest count since 1997) and 38 Arctic Terns passed through (part of the large movement throughout the country - and the biggest count here since 1983). The first two returning Whimbrel also came in to roost and a reeling Grasshopper Warbler was heard (first for the spring).

19/04/12 - The power of plastic strikes (again!)

Kane Brides from the WWT has been in touch again this week with details of another Whooper Swan recovery. 'K3K' has been sighted in Ross-shire, Scotland, it was originally ringed (as an adult) in the LDV at North Duffield Carrs during the 2008 cannon net catch. This is the second Whooper re-sighting that we've had of late - a few weeks ago data came back on 'K3H' - a bird ringed during the same catch in 2008, had been sighted in Norway - see Norway...? No way! for details.

2008 Whooper catch - North Duffield Carrs

 

'K3K' was present in the valley during the winter of 08/09 and then returned the following year and wintered in the valley during January 2010. It was next heard of on 24^th February 2010 when it was caught at the WWT centre at Caerlaverock, Dumfries, Scotland, presumably when it was returning northwards on its return migration to Iceland. It wasn’t seen or heard of until the following winter when it returned to the valley, it was first sighted on 26/11/10 and last sighted on 12/03/11. The most recent sightings have been the winter just gone - 2011/2012 - instead of wintering in the valley, 'K3K' returned once again to Scotland and on 22/11/11 it was sighted in Fearn, Drome, Nr Balintore (Ross-shire), followed by Tullich Farm, Nr Balintore (Ross-shire) on 16^th & 18^th March 2012, so clearly a change in wintering area.

History of Whooper Swan ‘K3K’:

Year		Method		Date		Location
2008		Caught		30/11/2008		LDV, North Yorkshire
2009		Sighting		03/01/2009		LDV, North Yorkshire
2009		Sighting		06/01/2009		LDV, North Yorkshire
2009		Sighting		08/01/2009		LDV, North Yorkshire
2009		Sighting		09/01/2009		LDV, North Yorkshire
2009		Sighting		19/02/2009		LDV, North Yorkshire
2009		Sighting		26/02/2009		LDV, North Yorkshire
2009		Sighting		07/03/2009		LDV, North Yorkshire
2009		Sighting		16/03/2009		LDV, North Yorkshire
2010		Sighting		02/01/2010		LDV, North Yorkshire
2010		Sighting		18/01/2010		LDV, North Yorkshire
2010		Sighting		19/01/2010		LDV, North Yorkshire
2010		Re-caught		24/02/2010		Caerlaverock, Dumfries
2010		Sighting		26/11/2010		LDV, North Yorkshire
2010		Sighting		12/12/2010		LDV, North Yorkshire
2010		Sighting		19/12/2010		LDV, North Yorkshire
2010		Sighting		24/12/2010		LDV, North Yorkshire
2010		Sighting		31/12/2010		LDV, North Yorkshire
2011		Sighting		03/01/2011		LDV, North Yorkshire
2011		Sighting		31/01/2011		LDV, North Yorkshire
2011		Sighting		05/02/2011		LDV, North Yorkshire
2011		Sighting		01/03/2011		LDV, North Yorkshire
2011		Sighting		05/03/2011		LDV, North Yorkshire
2011		Sighting		12/03/2011		LDV, North Yorkshire
2011		Sighting		22/11/2011		Fearn, Drome, Nr Balintore, Ross-shire
2012		Sighting		16/03/2012		Tullich Farm, Nr Balintore, Ross-shire
2012		Sighting		18/03/2012		Tullich Farm, Nr Balintore, Ross-shire

All the sightings from the valley were recorded by Peter & Janet Roworth, so thanks goes to them both for taking the time to get out & about looking for colour-ringed birds, it really is worthwhile especially when it leads to piecing together a birds journey. 

Whooper Swans - North Duffield Carrs

 

 Peter Roworth

The second recovery to come our way this week has been that of a colour-ringed Coot. It’s one from a few years ago which was first reported in 2010 but the sighting and photograph have only just come our way. The bird in question is the one from our latest blog post about colour-ringed birds (Look out look out colour-ringed birds are about!). It was ringed as a young male on 20/10/08 at North Duffield Carrs and was next seen on 29/11/10 at Cleethorpes Country Park, Lincolnshire. It was then seen a few days later on 06/12/10 by Colin Smale who took the superb photograph below. 

LDV colour-ringed Coot - Cleethorpes - 06/12/10

Colin Smale - FOTOLINCS.COM

Colin takes wildlife photographs on a regular basis around the Lincolnshire area, these can be seen on his website - http://www.fotolincs.com/ or you can follow him on twitter at - fotolincs. After tracking down the colour-ringed Coot and several other colour-ringed birds it resulted in an article being published in the Lincolnshire Today Magazine, this can be read here (page 71-72).

Colin has been photographing birds for many years but has recently become interested in colour-ringing after spotting several birds with colours on his 'patch'. He was most intrigued after taking photos of a flock of Knot and realising there were two birds with coloured flags. This is a snippet taken from the magazine article - "As I watched I suddenly noticed among the sea of greenish legs a splash of red - with one bird sporting a red ring with lettering on it. I couldn't quite see the letters so I photographed the bird, and when I enlarged the picture I could clearly see the letters 'ENY'. Within a few minutes there was a second colour-ringed bird. It too had a yellow 'tab' with the letters 'LUC' - which I thought very appropriate!"

Norwegian flagged Knot

 

Colin Smale - FOTOLINCS.COM

Eventually Colin found out that 'LUC' was ringed as an adult in May 2009 at Marnes in Northern Norway - about 1400 miles North East of Cleethorpes. It was seen a few days later in the same area but then it wasn't seen again until it appeared infront of Colin a year later - again in Cleethorpes. It's mate 'ENY' was ringed on the same beach but two years earlier in May 2007. She was seen again two years later at North Brenna in Porsanaga, Norway, and not seen again until she turned up with 'LUC' in Cleethorpes! For more details of Colin's colour-ringed sightings and to read the rest of this article click on the link above. Once again all the information that has been gained wouldn't have been possible without catching and colour-ringing these birds, showing again the importance of colour-ringing.

Colour-ringed Black-tailed Godwit

Colin Smale - FOTOLINCS.COM

It's really great (for us as ringers) to know that there's folk out there like Colin who enjoy taking wildlife photographs yet at the same time are contributing to the collection of ringing data and helping us to piece together the lives and journeys of the birds we love to watch!

Colin Smale - FOTOLINCS.COM

18/04/12 - High waters & herons...

Well the snow that fell two weeks ago around parts of Yorkshire & the continued heavy downpours of late have lead to the River Derwent, Ouse & Wharfe looking full to bursting....which has resulted in lots of water coming onto Bank Island, Wheldrake & North Duffield. This is largely good news as it has made the Ings a bit damper for the breeding waders and other wetland species and will keep water levels more attractive for other birds, like the Whimbrel which come to roost here until mid May. Unfortunately one of the pairs of Mute Swans have been flooded off their nest at North Duffield Carrs, but the other at the Top Pond has survived the rising waters and on Monday 9 eggs were present - if all the pairs have this many then it’ll be a busy time rounding up the cygnets - canoes at the ready!!

River Derwent (view from Wheldrake bridge) - 13/04/12

 

Dave decided to have one last go for Snipe last week before it’s time to turn our attention to the Whimbrel. He managed 4 Common Snipe, 1 Oystercatcher and 1 re-trap Redshank, originally ringed as a breeding adult at the same site in 2006. It’s very pleasing to catch a returning bird & it allowed Dave to add colour rings (in 2006 we hadn’t started colour-ringing waders). Whilst out Dave came across more completed Lapwing clutches and an Oystercatcher sitting on 2 eggs.

On Friday we zipped over to the heronry for a look round to see how far on the nest/chicks were, we counted around 20 active nests and the first of the chicks seemed to be nearing the right size for ringing (based on the noise they were making) so we’ll have to act quickly. Craig contacted Lewis Tree Surgery in Wheldrake to see if they fancied scaling up & down the trees to help with hoisting the chicks down for ringing, they were more than keen to help out with something abit different to what they normally do!

Adult herons circling

 

 Perching in the trees nearby

 Heron egg shell

The LDV Team have been ringing at the heronry since 2000 and 95 birds have been ringed from this site since then. We haven’t ringed any birds here since 2009 when we did 11 young so we’re hoping to get a good sample this year with some expert tree climbing help.

We only have two recoveries in the valley for herons, ringing at the heronry has produced just the one recovery, a chick ringed there made it to Northumberland (see below), and the other recovery was from a bird that was originally ringed in the Netherlands which made its way to Riccall (near Wheldrake).

LDV Recoveries: Grey Heron (Ardea cinerea):

Grey Heron (7017932) ringed as 1 (pullus) on 05/06/75 in Hemburg, Netherlands, recovered on 08/02/76 in Riccall, North Yorkshire (found dead). Distance 547 Km.

Grey Heron (1294396) ringed as 1 (pullus) on 08/05/02 in Thorganby, LDV, recovered on 05/01/05 in Haltwhistle, Northumberland (found dead). Distance 154 Km.

This year we plan to darvic the young birds which will hopefully lead to many field sightings.

14/04/12 - They're on the way!

Well it's almost that time of year now when the Whimbrel return!

Eight years ago, during 2004, the Lower Derwent Valley Whimbrel project started, it was based around the spring passage staging site at Wheldrake Ings. The site has been known as a spring staging site for the species since the early 1980's with a peak of up to 100-150 birds around the first week in May, building up from the first bird in mid April to the last bird in mid May. Birds appear on the LDV NNR at dusk to roost, but prior to 2004 we had no idea about anything else that these birds were up to. Whilst there had been quite a bit of research on the small British breeding population of Whimbrel in Northern Scotland over the years, there has been very little work on spring staging sites such as these except some work in the 1970's on a roost that no longer exists on Steart Island, Somerset.

Whimbrel - Wheldrake Ings - 09/05/05

Below are some of the questions we wanted to try and answer:

- Where do the birds go during the day

- How many birds are involved in the spring staging site

- How much turnover is there and how long do individual birds spend at the roost

- How important are such spring staging sites to those birds that migrate using this strategy

- How much weight do the birds gain

- What are the energetics involved

- Which races/breeding populations do birds using this site belong to

In an attempt to answer some of these questions, since 2004 a total of 100 Whimbrel have been caught and colour-ringed at the Lower Derwent Valley NNR spring roost. Several birds have been radio-tracked and four have been fitted with satellite trackers. 

Whimbrel with colour-rings - 27/04/07

Whimbrel fitted with radio tag - 25/04/05

Whimbrel fitted with satellite tag - 27/04/07

From this work we have now established that:

- Birds tend to feed locally to the roost site, often within 2-3 km, on semi-improved grassland but perhaps (and most significantly) on one specific soil type.

- Individual birds tend to spend 8-10 days at the roost, at which time they almost double their body weight (arriving at about 300-350g and leaving 550-600g - 8 days later!). 

- They are very site specific - often returning year after year to the exact same roost site and the exact same feeding fields nearby. Not only that but they appear to do so with amazing regularity, often turning up on the same date every year - keep watching our blog updates over the coming weeks to follow this years Whimbrel story. The first birds of the spring roost have usually (for the last five years)  appeared on 16th April (next Monday), although Dave had what was almost certainly 4 passage birds at the site at dawn on Tuesday of last week (11th).

- Birds appear at the roost (best viewed from Swantail Hide) around sunset (7.45 to 8.25 pm) - smaller numbers of birds may be found during the day when they move onto Wheldrake or Bank Island (occasionally North Duffield) for a drink and wash, although this is more frequent towards the end of the passage period.  

Please do keep an eye out and let us have ANY colour-ringed records, don't assume we have seen the birds or someone else has reported them - its usually not the case!

Colour-ringed Whimbrel - Wheldrake - 09/05/05