Sand Martin cliff

Work on the Sand Martin cliff continued, and in the end Doug & James removed quite a few of the shelves which make up the entrance tunnels to the nesting chambers. The wooden shelves were replaced with  black drainage pipes, so it will be interesting to see if the Sand Martins have a preference for the old wooden tunnels or the new plastic ones. 

The replaced rotten shelves

Doug inserting one of the new entrance tubes

Each of the 252 nest chambers were opened, inspected & if they had been used, cleaned out. Even though the doors to the nest chambers were clearly marked, it was usually possible to work out if the nests had been used by one or two broods, as the nesting material was generally in much better condition in the single-brood boxes.

Double-brood nest on the left, single on the right

In the two end sections where nest chambers hadn't been used, we put some clean hay as a 'starter nest' as we had heard anecdotal evidence that this may encourage the use of the chamber. In chambers that had been used, we generally removed the old nesting material and left clean sand with 'drag' marks so that it will be easier to see if birds have been into the chamber. The G section, which is the section furthest away from the path has been renamed the 'flea' section. Interestingly, we even found fleas in some of the chambers where there had been no nest, so are wondering if the fleas have come from birds roosting in the chambers over the winter rather than from the Sand Martins.  Any chamber with fleas was emptied completely, and fresh sand added. 

Fleas

There's been other wildlife in the chambers, mainly in the G/flea section:

Giant House Spider (and it was a giant!)

Peacock Butterfly

Moth cases....a few were infested

False Black Widow? 

Our Sand Martins probably overwinter in Senegal, and they should be leaving there this month, arriving back here in early to mid-March. We're looking forward to welcoming them, and hope they'll be happy with our house-keeping activities!

Mist netting 7/2/26

Ordinarily we may well have cancelled the session on Saturday morning as the forecast was iffy to say the least. However, as we were going to be on site anyway for the afternoon's AGM, we decided to give it a go. We were late starting to set up due to a deluge, but once the rain stopped, three of us put up four nets in the reeds & feeders behind the Discovery Hut. We only put up one feeder net rather than the usual two as the brook had burst its bank in one place & overtopped it in another, so was actually running through the second net ride. We were later joined by two new members who had an introduction to ringing, and who will hopefully be joining us again. 

We actually caught a few birds, with a nice range of species. We caught two Kingfishers, or rather three but one escaped before we could get to it.  It's always nice to be able to show birds to visitors to the reserve, and explain what ringing's all about.  Kingfishers are always a favourite, and we were sent some amazing photos taken by visitor Helen Warren. 

Helen also captured a lovely close-up of a Wren. 

One of the retraps was a female Blackbird originally ringed on 3/6/24. As an adult, the feathers of the wing were all uniform, and the tail was broad & in good condition. 

Adult female Blackbird

Wing of adult Blackbird

Tail of adult Blackbird

We had to close the nets a few times during showers, but on the whole it wasn't as wet as forecast & we were treated to a rather nice rainbow.

	Ringed	Retrapped
Blackbird		2
Blue Tit	2
Chaffinch	3	1
Chiffchaff	1
Dunnock	1	2
Greenfinch	1
Kingfisher	1	1
Treecreeper	1
Wren		1
	10	7

Mist netting 10th Jan

The first session of 2026 took place last Saturday, with a very civilised 730 start. There were five of us, and we set seven nets in the feeder & reed bed areas near to the Discovery Hut. It was a very cold start, so we made continual rounds to check the nets & didn't play lures of the smaller species until it warmed up a bit. 

It was pretty quiet, but we did catch 22 birds. As we've mostly been ringing in the area around the Discovery Hut recently, we did catch lots of retraps, although we did catch 8 new birds. We caught 3 Great Tits, including this female which was hatched last year (age code 5)

Great Tit

Great Tits can usually be aged using the difference in colour between the blue Greater Coverts which have been replaced during the post-juvenile moult, and the duller greener old Primary Coverts that are the original feathers grown in the nest. This bird had also replaced the small Alula feather which is a nice blue colour, leaving the two old greener Alula feathers unmoulted. 

Great Tit: hatched last year (age code 5)

The bird had a narrow, dull, patchy black stripe down its chest & belly. This indicates that it's a female, as a male would have a much darker, glossy, unbroken black stripe that would reach out as far as the legs at the base of the belly. 

Great Tit: female

Young Blue Tits often replace their centre two tail feathers, which can also be helpful in ageing the bird. However the majority of young Great Tits replace all tail feathers during their post-juvenile moult, so their tail is usually of no use for ageing purposes. 

We only caught one Reed Bunting, which we recorded as an adult male. The head was quite black, and it had a white collar. This normally indicates that the bird is male, however there have been records of birds with completely black heads & white collars which are female. Another feature which can help to confirm the sex of the bird is the greyness of the rump. This bird had a very grey bump, confirming that it was a male. The tail was quite rounded & in good condition, and although young birds can also sometimes replace their tails, as the rest of the feathers were also in good condition, it indicated that the feathers were probably better quality adult feathers. 

Reed Bunting

Reed Bunting: Grey rump confirming that it's male

We also retrapped a Kingfisher that had been ringed in October. You can never have too many Kingfishers! There were quite a few visitors to the Discovery Hut at the time who appreciated a close up view.

Ian with the Kingfisher 

	Ringed	Retrapped
Blue Tit	1	3
Chaffinch	2
Chiffchaff	1
Coal Tit	1
Dunnock		3
Great Tit	1	2
Kingfisher		1
Reed Bunting	1
Robin		3
Wren	1	2
	8	14

Meanwhile, Doug was busy with some maintenance in the Sand Martin cliff, removing a shelf that had rotted. Not a nice job, but the shelf needs to be replaced before the Sand Martins start arriving in March. 

Doug in his PPE

The shelf with tunnels that run from the cliff front to the nest chamber

Christmas mist netting 20/12/2025

We met at the very civilised time of 8am for the last session of 2025. The session was nearly cancelled due to the dodgy weather forecast, but luckily we managed to remain dry, although it was rather too windy. We set 6 nets in the feeder area,  the reed bed & next to the Reed Base classroom where we set up our ringing station for the morning. It was a good turn out, with 8 members attending.

We only caught 17 birds, although we had a nice variety including our 11th Kingfisher & 3rd Treecreeper of the year. Ten of the birds were re-traps, mostly from earlier this year, and with just one Goldcrest & a Blackbird from last year. 

Part of the Team working in the Reed Base

Female Kingfisher, as indicated by the amount of red on the lower mandible

Treecreeper

We also caught a Coal Tit, only the 2nd this year, and the 22nd in the last decade. The bird was aged as a 3, ie hatched this year. It had replaced its inner Greater Coverts, which had a blacker centre & greyish-blue edge when compared with the 4  old Greater Coverts (OGCs) which had slightly browner centres & a a paler greenish fringe.  The colour of the OGCs was the same as that of the un-moulted old Primary Coverts & Alula. 

Coal Tit

Coal Tit wing

We found some Otter paw prints near to one of the nets set beside a small stream, the size of them suggests that it was a male. 

Otter prints

After the ringing, we indulged in some festive nibbles & a bird ID/ringing quiz, set by Adrian in memory of local ringer Geoff Pearce, who sadly died this year. Geoff specialised in pulli (nestlings), particularly Barn & Tawny Owls, which he'd been ringing for decades,  kindly giving several Group members the opportunity to join him & gain valuable experience. 

	Ringed	Retrapped
Blackbird		1
Blue Tit	1	2
Chiffchaff		1
Coal Tit	1
Goldcrest	2	4
Great Tit	1	1
Kingfisher	1
Treecreeper	1
Wren		1
	7	10

A different perspective.....

Mark Loughlin writes a regular piece for the Turn Lyme Green website. His latest article is about his recent experiences as a new Trainee ringer, and can be found here:

https://www.turnlymegreen.co.uk/lymelight/birdringingdecember2025