I spent most of today at Colyford Common with the ringing group and because it's getting near to Xmas we had a nice selection of festive fare to tuck into too, including plenty of scrummy cakes of which I ate more (many more) than I'd care to admit! We caught a nice selection of birds, Teal 1, Mallard 1, Moorhen 1, Greenfinch 7, Blue Tit 11 (2), Great Tit (1), Cetti's Warbler 3 (2), Blackbird 2, Song Thrush 1, Kingfisher (2), Chiffchaff 1 and Long-tailed Tit (1)
( ( ) = retrap).
Cetti's Warbler.
One of the group's specialty birds.
I never get tired of seeing these up close in the hand.
Another is Kingfisher.
Two adult females were caught today, both retraps, one ringed this year and the other from 2008.
Highlight of the day.
Quite a bit of snap for just nine people, we easily polished most of it off though.
Doug's mulled wine also went down very well.
THE bird highlight of the day was this handsome drake Teal .
He was really popular with the duck cuddlers of the group...
... See
(I wont mention that I actually saw him kissing this duck!!)
Me too...
Guilty has charged! I foolishly donned my 'beige anorak' for this ringing session even though it had just had its biannual wash. It is now (as you may be able to see in the photo) covered in pongy duck crap! Oh well, gets one to the front in supermarket queues etc. Handy at this time of year;-)
Finally here's a photo of the whole team from today, unfortunately the very bright low sun, caused a few burnt out highlights.
Here's a very similar shot taken by Mike
(his camera had the same problem coping with the lighting)
Why put an almost identical photo on? Well I had to, because I'm in it and I'm a modest raving narcissistic egomaniac!
3 comments:
OMG I am dead jealous over the Christmas fair stuff, I suppose I could do this here in Staffordshire, mmmmm Marstons Pedigree would have to be on the menu though.
That Teal looks amazingly small in the hand! Lovely!
I hope Steve exercised restraint when confronted with all that nosh - it looks pretty similar to the necessary sustenance that occupies his passenger seat on a 20 minute jaunt up the estuary :o)
Good anorak choice! ;o)
Martyn - Marston's Pedigree used to be my beverage of choice many moons ago before I suddenly developed my socially crippling 'alcohol allergy' ( a lack of the enzyme Aldehyde dehydrogenase to be boringly accurate) which to be honest stinks!! :-(
Still really enjoyed the cakes though! :-)
Gav - Incredibly Steve exercised a little bit more restraint than me on the cake front I'm ashamed to say.
Must give some of my other gorgeous anoraks an airing some time ;-)
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