Most critical fowl photographers dislike taking photos of birds carrying rings (or what on the opposite aspect of the Atlantic you name bands). I can sympathise, as a shiny new ring, clamped to a fowl’s leg, not often enhances its portrait. Frustratingly, customary aluminium fowl rings are nearly all the time unattainable to learn until the fowl is within the hand, as even the perfect of images not often enable the ring’s quantity to be learn. I’d like to have recognized the place and when the Nice Noticed Woodpecker in my {photograph} under was ringed, however although the ring is clearly seen, the quantity stamped on it isn’t.
Nevertheless, lately there’s been a rising pattern to mark greater birds, comparable to wildfowl and waders, with both color rings, or Darvic plastic rings. The latter are all the time stamped with massive letters or numbers, permitting them to be learn simply with the assistance of a telescope and even binoculars. Then it’s a matter of doing a little analysis on the web to search out who rang the fowl you noticed, after which emailing the small print of your sighting. With luck you’ll get a speedy reply, telling you the fowl’s historical past.
I photographed the Black-tailed Godwit in my {photograph} (above) on 18 September 2020. It was feeding on mud flats within the harbour of Brancaster Staithe, on the North Norfolk coast. With its placing mixture of color rings I suspected that it might be straightforward to search out out extra about this specific fowl, and I used to be proper. I found that it had been ringed on 26 September 2016 at Iken, on the River Alde on the Suffolk coast, so nearly precisely 4 years earlier than my sighting. The knowledge I obtained didn’t point out the age of the fowl. Black-tailed godwits winter in massive numbers on the estuaries of each Norfolk and Suffolk, and we all know that just about all these birds breed in Iceland. They’re of the race islandica, a sub species of the nominate race, limosa. In breeding plumage islandica godwits develop a deeper crimson plumage than their limosa cousins. Very small numbers of limosa birds do nest in England, whereas a number of islandica breed in Orkney and Shetland.
After being ringed my godwit (EY70 137) wasn’t seen once more till 1 July 2017, when it was reported from Aldeburgh City Marshes, not removed from the place it was first ringed. It then settled again at Hazlewood marshes on the Alde estuary; it was reported from right here 12 extra instances till the final sighting on 9 September. As soon as once more the fowl disappeared, or at the least wasn’t reported, till it was famous at Titchwell RSPB Reserve on the North Norfolk coast on 10 July 2018. It clearly appreciated Titchwell, for there have been one other 11 sightings from the identical web site, the final on 16 September. There was only one sighting away from Titchwell that summer time, at Snettisham RSPB reserve, only a few miles west of Titchwell.
Black-tailed Godwits on the transfer. Many of the Icelandic inhabitants winters within the British isles
The sightings stopped, however then on 18 February 2019 EY70 137 was noticed on Girl’s Island Lake, Wexford, Eire. Was this the place it spent its winters? It appears extremely doubtless that it was. Nevertheless it was again at Titchwell once more on 6 July, earlier than transferring to close by Brancaster Staithe on 13 August. There have been seven extra sightings of it right here, the final on 20 October. Did it then transfer on to Eire? In the summertime of 2020 it was again at Brancaster Staithe once more, with the primary report on 23 July. It was reported a number of extra instances earlier than my sighting, with the final report that I do know of on 30 September. Black-tailed Godwits are long-lived birds, so EY70 137 could be nonetheless be alive.
Such a terrific variety of sightings of the identical fowl are spectacular, and a mirrored image on the variety of observers now we have right here in Norfolk and Suffolk. It was additionally notable that EY70 137 was a very confiding and approachable particular person, which is why it was reported so many instances. The repeat sightings reveal an awesome deal concerning the fowl’s actions, however in fact we don’t know the place it bred. One assumes Iceland, however there’s no proof. That’s why the present pattern to radio-tag birds reveals a lot greater than ringing, although it’s in fact vastly costlier.
I photographed the godwit due to the rings, however after I pressed the shutter on the Black-headed Gull (above) I hadn’t even observed that it was ringed. Solely after I downloaded my photos did I spot the ring, which was clear and straightforward to learn (2BAT). As soon as once more I did my web analysis and managed to contact the one who had ringed the gull. I photographed it at Gorleston, on the Suffolk coast, on 5 September 2020, however I found that fowl had been rung, as an grownup, at close by Nice Yarmouth on 16 November 2013, so it was most likely already 9 years outdated, and will nicely have been older.
The primary sighting of it after being rung was near the city of Utena in north-east Lithuania on 11 July 2015. Although these gulls nest generally within the British Isles, within the autumn nice numbers transfer throughout to Britain from nesting grounds in Finland, Sweden and the Baltic states, so it appears almost certainly that 2BAT was a gull that had been bred in Lithuania, and that it returned to nest there each spring. It was, nevertheless, loyal to its wintering grounds in Suffolk, for it was seen once more at Gorleston (the place I photographed it) on 6 October 2016, 27 November 2016 and 14 November 2019. Whether or not it has been seen once more I don’t know, however I discovered its historical past fascinating.
Rings aren’t the one approach of marking birds, and with various species wing tags are extra typically used. After I photographed the Pink Kite (above) close to my residence in Suffolk I hadn’t observed its wing tags. It was solely after I had downloaded my images on my iPad that I observed that the fowl was tagged, with a yellow tag 4F in every wing. A fast search on the Web revealed that it had been tagged at Benington in North Hertfordshire in August 2018.
I despatched my report to the Southern Color Ringing Group, considered one of whose members had tagged and ringed the kite, and inside an hour I had obtained a reply from the group’s chief, Paul Roper, telling me that this was the primary sighting of one of many group’s tagged kites exterior Hertfordshire, including that “this was a fowl caught in a spring lure in August so doubtlessly a wandering fowl that had been bred elsewhere. It was ringed by considered one of my trainees and he will likely be more than happy it has been seen such a distance away”. It was the primary reported sighting of 4F because it was tagged 7 months and 27 days earlier than, and it had travelled 82km NE.
Every week after seeing and photographing the kite I used to be in Northern Morocco, watching birds on the Merja Zerga, a sprawling estuary that it is a crucial feeding space for a lot of migrant birds. Right here I noticed and photographed two Audouin’s Gulls, each carrying rings that I might learn from my images (see images above). Audouin’s Gull is a beautiful species restricted as a breeding fowl to the Mediterranean, however many winter in North Africa. The rings revealed that one of many birds had been ringed as an grownup in Portugal, the opposite as a chick in Spain’s Ebro delta, the place the most important colony of those gulls is to be discovered.
Tagging and marking birds with rings that may be learn at a distance continues to disclose new info about fowl actions and migrations. It appears shocking that kite 4F hadn’t been recorded between being tagged in August and showing in Suffolk in March, so one wonders the place it had spent these months? Within the case of the Audouin’s Gulls my sightings affirm the significance of the varied wetlands and estuaries of North Morocco as wintering grounds. As a result of it has a comparatively small inhabitants, Audouin’s Gull is classed as Susceptible within the Spanish Pink Ebook, which suggests it’s at excessive threat.
My most up-to-date expertise with a Darvic-ringed gull was in Andalucia final month, after I photographed the Lesser Black-backed Gull in my {photograph} (above) on the Playa de Zahora (Zahora seaside, near Cape Trafalgar). It was solely after I first pointed my digicam at it that I noticed the ring on its leg, whereas it wasn’t till I downloaded the {photograph} that I observed that the unlucky fowl was badly entangled with nylon fishing line. As typical, I checked on its historical past, discovering that it had first been ringed at Marbella, close to Malaga, on the Spanish Mediterranean coast on 5 October 2022. Sixteen days after being ringed it was seen at Rota, on Spain’s Atlantic coast, with the following sighting at Puerto de la caleta de Velez on 4 April 2023. There was one additional sighting in 2023 at Vertedero R. S. U. los Ruices on 3 October. My {photograph} was taken on 4 February, 186km from the ringing web site, and 584 days after it was first ringed. By a number of Lesser Black-backs nest in Spain, this fowl was almost certainly to have been a winter customer to the world from breeding grounds in Northern Europe. Jose Sanchez Cordero (the Luscinia banding group coordinator) kindly despatched me this info, and he did ask me whether or not it was attainable to catch the fowl and untangle it. Sadly, it wasn’t, because the fowl was nonetheless flying strongly. Nevertheless, I doubt if it is going to be returning to Northern Europe this spring.