AN OLD FRIEND RETURNS

Waxwing colour-ringing this winter has been taking place in Orkney, NE Scotland and Newtown in Wales (so far up to mid-January 2024). As in previous winters there has been a single colour ring with the metal put on one leg and 2 or 3 colour rings on the other. I’m sure everybody who has seen and or photographed a colour-ringed Waxwing is happy that the bird is in no way bothered or hindered by these small and very light weight rings and is going about its activities in the very same way as all the others in the flock.

BWR stretching for a Mistletoe berry Great Malvern, Worcestershire 06/01/24, Simon Pugh

GYW drinking Hassop Station, Derbyshire 29/12/23, Simon Benyon

Metal over blue is the code for this winter 2023/24, on the right leg for Scotland and on the left leg for Wales, with the other colour rings on the opposite leg.

In case you are wondering we don’t give the birds names, just the abbreviations of their colour ring combinations!  eg BOB is Blue over Orange over Blue colour rings.

A = Ash/Grey (as G is used for Dark Green), B = Blue, G =Dark Green, L = Light Green, N = Black (Niger as B is already used for Blue), O = Orange, R = Red, White = White, Y = Yellow.

OLO Aldermaston, Berkshire 24/01/24, Dave Webster

BLB Newton Aycliffe, County Durham 16/12/23, Roger Simpson

 I think some of the observers in Colchester, Essex were quite pleased to have their colour-ringed Waxwing quaintly called BOB around, maybe not aware that it was an abbreviation of the colour ring combination until the not so quaintly named WOO (White over Orange over Orange) turned up from Stoke-on-Trent!

BOB Severalls Industrial Park, Colchester  15/12/23, John French

WOO Fenton, Stoke on Trent 09/12/23, Phil Cooper

So with lots and lots of photographs/sightings coming in during November and December showing a metal over blue ring on one of the legs it came as a bit of a surprise when an email from Alex Jones (not the one from the One Show I don’t think but I haven’t asked) came in alerting us to a post on a local WhatsApp group he’d seen with a photo of a colour-ringed Waxwing taken by Fred Fearn at Abergele, North Wales clearly showing a metal ring over a red colour ring on the right leg (and White over Red over Yellow on the left). This was the code for last winter, 2022/23, when we ringed a mere 25 Waxwings in a winter of very small numbers. I quickly got back in touch with Alex asking if there’s any way he could get in touch with Fred to, most importantly of all, get a date of when the photograph was taken to confirm it was from this winter. Fred replied himself saying it was taken on 1^st Jan 2024. What a great start to the New Year!

MR-WRY Abergele, North Wales 01/01/24, Fred Fearn 

So it was indeed a returning bird from winter 2022/23. A quick look at our ringing records showed WRY to have been ringed as a juvenile female by Innes on 30^th Nov. 2022. She was 1 of 4 birds Innes, Sam and Raymond managed to catch that morning standing with a mist net across the pavement outside a pub in Kincorth, Aberdeen. We remember laughing with a mannie that we were playing badminton! Then we were delighted to hear about her again when she rather unexpectedly headed back across the North Sea to be resighted/photographed in Denmark on 26^th Jan 2023 by Flemming Pedersen! 

MR-WRY Aalborg, Denmark 26/01/23, Flemming Pedersen

It's very exciting when we get a returning bird as we don’t get many (I think this our 8^th from around 4550 Waxwings ringed over the years by Grampian RG). Waxwings aren’t nailed on annual winter visitors like the Redwings and Fieldfares which arrive every winter from Scandinavia. Some winters can see very few if any Waxwings arrive at all, being an irruptive species dependent on the availability of berries back home.

A huge thank you to you all for reporting your colour ringed Waxwing sightings to us and kindly allowing us to use some of your super photographs on our blog. These one or two colour-ringed birds within a flock of 3 - 100 birds (or the exceptional 11 in the flock of 250+ at Hassop Station, Derbyshire!) allows us to track their movements and gives us a little insight into the vagaries of their fascinating social life, movements, fidelity and survival.

Raymond and Grampian Ringing Group