29th October

Again it was quite breezy at Whitburn but the two mounds gave some shelter from the wind.  We were joined today by Paul House, a ringer from the Chew Valley ringing group.  Ringing started fairly slow with the odd robin and chaffinch being pulled in by the tapes.  During a net round a flock of long-tailed tits flew into the big mound followed by a distictly smaller bird.  I was hoping for a pallas's warbler, I had my fingers crossed.  A few net rounds later we caught the long-tailed tit flock and in with them was a stonking juvenile male firecrest. This is only the second firecrest to be ringed at the obs. It certainly was a long tailed tit day with a total of 31 new birds trapped plus a control bird which was ringed elsewhere (EAR502 do you recognise it?).  A male bullfinch was observed getting out of the net which was gutting but a female was sat in the next net.  This was the first bullfinch ringed at the obs.

Ringing totals included 31 long-tailed tit, 4 chaffinch, 2 robin and singles of coal tit, dunnock, firecrest, song thrush. Retraps included 2 robin and singles of blackcap, blackbird, chiffchaff and the control long-tailed tit.

 Firecrest © Adrian George

28th October

Early in the week the forecast looked great for ringing on Friday.  I got clearance from week to cram in a weeks work into 4 days.  Unfortunately by thursday the forecast had changed, as usual, and looked quite breezy.  Ringing went well tho with a few robin and blackcap being trapped. The afternoon was particularly quiet although the roost catch proved fruitful with 3 new robins and 3 blackbirds.

Ringing totals included 7 robin, blackbird and blackcap, 6 blue tit, 5 chaffinch and singles of song thrush, wren, chiffchaff and goldcrest. Retraps consisted of 6 blackbird and a wren.

26th October

Ringing totals included 10 blackbird and singles of song thrush, redwing, blackcap and great tit.

25th October

Ringing totals included two blue tits and a chiffchaff.

22nd October

Ringing totals consisted of a single blue tit.

21st October

Ringing totals included a blue tit and a lesser redpoll

Ageing & Sexing Bluetails

After reading the blogs of other ringers who were fortunate enough to also trap and ring red-flanked bluetails last week, I noticed that most of them had sexed their birds.  Svensson (1992) says that juvenile birds can not clearly be sexed unless there is blue in the lesser and medium coverts, thus indicating a male.  However Mark Newsome kindly forwarded me a copy of British Birds 102, September 2009 which featured an article on ageing and sexing of Asian chats and included red-flanked bluetail.  Males clearly have a much brighter blue rump and tail feathers over females.  The females also show a greyish cast on the tail which is lacking on males.  On review of photos of the Whitburn 2011 bird, I have come to the conclusion that this was a juvenile male.  The photos below show how bright the rump is on this bird.

© Chris Bell

© Adrian George

After reviewing Paul Hindess video on youtube of the 2009 Whitburn bluetail,  I believe that this was also a male.