Meisen Wood, Germany - October 8th - Meagre Offerings

104m nets

Sound: Goldcrest, Chaffinch, Robin and Dunnock

Weather: initial rain clearing and becoming a fine, warm sunny morning.

Ringers: CS and EB

Species	New	Re - trap	Totals
Blue Tit	4	1	5
Chaffinch	1		1
Crested Tit	1		1
Goldcrest	3	1	4
Great Tit	3	3	6
Marsh Tit	1		1
Totals	13	5	18

A rain delayed start allowed us to have a more leisurely and fulsome breakfast.  The disappointing totals can only be partially explained by a weather shortened session.  The comparable dates have an average catch of 56 birds, which were chiefly composed of Goldcrests.  To date there have been no indications of Goldcrest migration which is unsurprising given the stormy, windy weather we have been having. 

Despite this, the day’s meagre tally contained some interesting data.  Three each of the Blue and Great Tits had fat scores of 2 or 3; so are they passage migrants?  Fat score is not an absolute indicator of migratory behaviour but it is strongly suggestive.  Future re-trapping encounters will potentially provide an answer.  A re-trap Great Tit was ringed as a pullus in May.  We don’t recapture many of the pulli we ring, presumably because many of them rapidly become fodder for local predators.  The 12^th new Marsh Tit of the year was a fine addition to the day’s figures.

A Crested Tit is always most welcome, these diminutively handsome birds are present locally in low abundance.  In the Heligoland Ringing Area about one hundred are ringed annually.  Typically we ring about 10 per annum and re-trap several individuals from this and previous years.  Differentiating adults and juveniles is fairly straight forward until late winter/early spring thus we obtain a crude indication of how the local population is faring; part of the value of ringing.

One advantage of the continuous wet, warm weather is the abundance of fungi in the woods; the Earthstars are particularly impressive.