Wendover CES#6 26th June 2017

A beautiful calm morning and not as hot as the previous session resulted in a steady catch throughout the period resulting in a slightly above average total of 53. Resident species such as ROBIN and DUNNO seem to be doing well and CHIFF numbers are also OK. However the major concern is the total absence of breeding WHITE. Something similar happened in 2013 when only 1 male, 1 female and 2 juveniles were trapped. However they recovered somewhat in 2014 when 19 new birds were ringed - we'll see if this is a similar blip in due course.
The first ever CES WOODP was trapped - and weighed using a rather precarious arrangement of balance, spacer and large plastic tray to hold it in.
The most unpleasant birds of the morning were the SONTH which all contained repulsive flat flies that jumped out on to the ringers present.

Wendover 26/6/2017

	1st Year	Adult	Total
Blackcap	4	2	6
Bullfinch	2	2	4
Chaffinch	2		2
Chiffchaff	4	1	5
Dunnock	8	1	9
Great Tit	3		3
Lesser Whitethroat		1	1
Long-tailed Tit	5	1	6
Robin	9	1	10
Song Thrush	3	1	4
Woodpigeon		1	1
Wren		2	2
Visit Total	40	13	53

Pete, Ginny & Adam.

Bee Orchid

Marbled White at Wendover (25/6/2017)

Wilstone Reservoir 26th June 2017

Nets up 5.30 to 11.30am

Ringers: JT JSJ and SM

Warm and calm

A very pleasant morning at Wilstone with a good number of birds nearly all juveniles and mostly chiffchaff and reewas . One control chiff, HRJ062 and two Marsworth birds: a reebu Y635045 (ringed as a 3J in 2015), a chiff JYV146 (this year's juvenile) and also a greti from Drayton Beauchamp TV41177.

Johne

Wilstone 26/6/2017

	New	Retrap	Total
Blackbird	1		1
Blackcap	10	3	13
Blue Tit	3		3
Bullfinch		1	1
Cetti’s Warbler	1		1
Chiffchaff	19	4	23
Goldcrest	1		1
Great Tit	2	2	4
Long-tailed Tit	5	4	9
Reed Bunting	1	2	3
Reed Warbler	4	1	5
Robin	3		3
Sedge Warbler	1	3	4
Song Thrush		2	2
Treecreeper		1	1
Wren	6	3	9
Total	57	26	83

Wilstone Reservoir at dawn

Marsworth 25th June 2017 - CES 6

Site: Marsworth Reservoir
Nets: 540' open 4:40 - 10.40am
Ringers: LL,CMS,CK,GK
Weather: Westerly 10 - 15mph, cloudy

With the forecast for the rest of the week looking very unsettled we took the chance to get CES 6 done today. Glad we did because despite the wind, threatening showers and a worrying mid-morning lull, we had a good session with 83 birds caught and 80% of them juvenile - demonstrating that the breeding season is going very well.

With four of us there the nets went up quickly and although the first net round was quiet, at 5:30am we had a good round of mainly young chiffchaffs and blackcaps but also juvenile robins, wrens and blackbird.

We had another juvenile reed bunting side by side with an adult male which we colour-ringed. Hopefully we will be able to re-sight these birds at the reservoirs over winter.

We caught our first young reed warblers, a second juvenile cetti's warbler and another six young wrens. The wren's nest we are monitoring is nearly ready to fledge so we are promised more next week!

The reed bed is now nearly at full height and the rides are full of marsh bedstraw and there is water figwort coming into flower.

Marsh bedstraw Galium palustre

Water Figwort Scrophularia nodosa

At around 9am it started to go quiet and for a while I thought it was going to be a disappointing total but just as we started to think about taking the nets down we were hit by a lovely flock of young tits, chiffchaff and our first young goldcrest. Twenty nine birds in the last round brought the total up to 83 which is well above the average of 60 for CES#6.

	New	Retrap	Total
Blackbird	1		1
Blackcap	10	3	13
Blue Tit	3		3
Bullfinch		1	1
Cetti’s Warbler	1		1
Chiffchaff	19	4	23
Goldcrest	1		1
Great Tit	2	2	4
Long-tailed Tit	5	4	9
Reed Bunting	1	2	3
Reed Warbler	4	1	5
Robin	3		3
Sedge Warbler	1	3	4
Song Thrush		2	2
Treecreeper		1	1
Wren	6	3	9
Total	57	26	83

Smoky Wainscot

During our quiet mid-morning we had a look around for insects and found a few interesting ones.

Scorpion Fly

Wilstone 19th June 2017

Site: Wilstone Reservoir
Ringers: JT, MCC and new trainee SM
Nets 540' up 05:30am  - 11:30am

A hot and calm Monday morning led to a total of 90 birds handled.

Good numbers of juveniles, 54 of the 90, mostly chiffs and blackcaps, also plenty of sedge and reed warblers.

 A female whitethroat was caught and a grasshopper warbler was singing on and off from Rushey Meadow.

	New	Retrap	Total
BLACA	13	1	14
BLUTI	9		9
CHIFF	14	2	16
GRETI	1		1
REEBU		1	1
REEWA	9	11	20
ROBIN	5		5
SEDWA	8	6	14
SONTH	2	1	3
TREEC	1		1
WHITE	1		1
WREN	4		4
Total	68	22	90

Johne