Colour-ringing of Upland and Lowland Stonechats in Grampian

 During 2022 Stonechats have been colour-ringed in Grampian in an attempt to find out a bit more about their survival in relation to movements and territory habitats throughout the year.

Ringing has taken place at two main locations; Glen Dye, the upland site (300m asl) and Forvie National Nature Reserve (NNR) the lowland site (50m asl). As of 21/11/2022 a total of 107 Stonechats have been ringed as part of this project.

The colour-ringing scheme involves adding a white coded ring above the normal BTO metal ring on the right tarsus and two coloured rings on the left tarsus.

In Glen Dye, most birds were trapped by mist nets, whilst at Forvie, all captures were executed by spring traps. Ninety-two Stonechats were ringed in the Glen Dye area and 15 were ringed at Forvie and other lowland sites. Juveniles made up the majority of birds trapped in Glen Dye, with only two adults being caught there. Most birds at lowland sites were seen during autumn and noted to be in pairs.

So far, only a few birds have been resighted or recaptured and all bar one were observed near their ringing location. The exception to this was a surprising record of a juvenile male, ringed in Glen Dye on 19 July 2022 and photographed at Rhoon, near Rotterdam, The Netherlands, on 11 November 2022, a dispersal distance of approximately 727 km.

Of all 55,563 Stonechats ringed in the UK up to the end of 2021, only 49 have been recovered abroad, mainly Spain, but none of these were in the Netherlands. This is therefore the first record of a Stonechat, ringed in the UK and seen in the Netherlands.

Stonechat WN(A),M /RN photographed in the Netherlands 11/11/2022

Stonechat WN(A),M /RN when ringed in Glen Dye 19/07/2022

Please keep an eye on your local Stonechats and report any sightings and colour-ringed birds in the usual way.

Moray Souter

Ring ouzel resightings from Glen Clunie

 On 25 September 2022, a colour ringed ring ouzel was photographed at a headland near Santander, northern Spain, by Guillermo Lazaro. This bird had been ringed as a chick on 17 May from a brood of 5 (ring number LL21463) in Glen Clunie by Innes Sim and Alys Perry, as part of a project aimed at finding out more about their migration journeys to and from their winter quarters by fitting adults with GPS tags. 

Ringed as pullus in Glen Clunie May 2022, sighted in Santander Northern Spain September 2022

It was the smallest of the 5 chicks, but not a runt, and all chicks fledged around 21 May. Both adults were unringed initially, but both were caught and colour ringed, and the male fitted with a tag. The same pair had a second nest around 300m away and reared a brood of 3, all of which fledged around 2 July. Both adults were retrapped and the female fitted with a tag. Two previous sightings of chicks from Glen Clunie, both in 2013, were on 15 and 27 October in Isles of Scilly and Portland, Dorset, respectively. And data from 2 tagged birds in 2018 showed that they left Glen Clunie on 2 and 5 October. So, this bird seems to have left the UK unusually early.

 

Ringed in Glen Clunie in July 2013, sighted at Portland, Dorset October 2013

Ringed in Glen Clunie as a chick in June 2013, sighted on the Scilly Isles October 2013

Twenty adult ring ouzels were fitted with GPS tags in Glen Clunie in 2022. These tags were programmed to take a fix once per day between 1 September 2022 and 30 April 2023. Each fix should be accurate to around 10m, but the bird has to be retrapped in order to access the data. We obtained high quality data from 2 tagged birds which were retrapped in 2019, so fingers crossed that we can catch any returning adults in 2023.

More amazing news from the Aberdeen Mandarin

Well folks, here's the latest mind-boggling episode on the life and times of 'Mac' our local celebrity drake Mandarin Duck!

Following an email I received yesterday morning suggesting that 'Mac' had possibly been sighted away from the Johnston Gardens area I put out a request for sightings/info to try establish his last know sighting locally.

Amazingly, Vicky Hall (via a local FB wildlife group) has been able to confirm with the aid of the photo below that 'Mac' was present at Walker Dam, Aberdeen, till at least 6.30pm on Thursday 14th April.

 What's more astounding is… just 110hrs (4.5 days) later, at 9.00am on the morning of 19th April, our very own wee 'Mac' was again photographed (see second photo below) but this time the photo was taken by Morten Lie ….have you guessed what's coming next?  Yep, wee 'Mac' has indeed flown back over the North Sea and was snapped by Morten at Krokstadelva near Drammen, just south-west of Oslo!!! How mad is that?

 It was major news in the bird ringing world to learn of his initial journey over here last September after being ringed near Oslo last Spring but for him to return there now makes this record truly unprecedented!

It now very much appears that this wee fella has been traversing the North Sea annually, spending his winters here in Aberdeen (since approx. 2011/12) and summering over near Oslo. We'd have known nothing of his amazing adventures and assumed he just moved away from Aberdeen each summer to find a mate locally had he not been ringed last spring near Oslo?

So I wonder what will happen next? I guess we'll just have to wait till later this summer/autumn and see if we can pick up his arrival back in Aberdeen to continue the story?

Harry Scott
picades@ifb.co.uk

PS. Many thanks to everyone who's been involved in this story so far, every little bit of information has been a huge help to keep an accurate track of this hyper-mobile wee dazzler!

Golden plover in North East Scotland

Since 2011 GRG have been studying Golden Plovers at Rattery Head in North East Scotland.  Birds start to arrive in early July, complete their moult and then spend the winter here.

The first  birds arrive in early July peak about the 2nd week of August when there are between 500 and 1000 in the flock, this number remains pretty stable until the end of September when their numbers increase dramatically with up to 5000 being seen there.

Birds have been caught  and colour ringed with an individual colour combination to allow individuals to be recognised in the field. Among the birds we caught was a pullus that we had ringed on the Scottish mountains two years previously and another pullus had its ring read near Edinburgh the previous year. This gave us a strong hint that at least some of the birds present on the Scottish coast were in fact Scottish breeders.

Brood of golden plover with one egg still to hatch

One of the birds ringed in 2011 was then seen on the Outer Hebrides on the Isle of Harris on the 5 June 2012 again suggesting a Scottish breeder. This bird has not been seen again.

One of our colour-ringed birds on Harris, June 2012

Over the next couple of years from colour marked individuals from 2011 have regularly been seen again along the same stretch of coastline, suggesting some site fidelity of the birds to their wintering grounds, others have however never been seen again despite regular searches through the flocks for colour marked individuals. Many birds have been seen repeatedly.

Then on the 22 January this year DE52076 bird was reported form Curragh Racecourse, Kildare, Ireland, this had been ringed on the 21 August 2011 at Rattery Head. It had been previously seen at Buchanhaven /Peterhead in August/September 2012, 2013 and 2014.

Golden Plover DE52076 ringed 21 August 2011 at Rattray Head, Aberdeenshire

So why this bird now decided to move to Ireland after staying in the north east for the previous years we cannot say, however as the bird has been seen in the autumn only in the previous years it may have moved to Ireland every winter. Perhaps future years will provide more information regarding this bird.

Clearly we have much yet to learn about the movements of these birds and what initiates the need to move; cold weather can certainly be ruled out as the winter of 2014-15 in North east has been exceptionally mild.

We intend to continue ringing both pullus and adult birds in the forthcoming years and will be grateful of any sightings of colour marked Golden Plovers

A curlew sighting at last

In the summers of 2013 and 2014 we have been colour-ringing curlews in Aberdeenshire to look at brood survival and habitat use, as part of the RSPB's wider work locally in waders. On Orkney they have been doing similar and had lots of local sightings over the winter.

Curlew chicks in Donside (Jenny Weston)

We've not been so lucky and had a single sighting on the Ythan in August 2013 and a bird last summer in the non-breeding flock. A couple of weeks ago these got blown out the park by an email from Ireland of a chick ringed near Corgarff in Donside in June 2014 foraging on a sports field in Dublin! Many thanks to Conn O'Brien for passing this on to us through Birdwatch Ireland.

A curlew from Donside in Dublin (Conn O'Brien)

We had always thought that our lack of sightings and recoveries from curlew in the winter was because they were in very remote areas on the west coast of Scotland and Ireland, but it looks as though they are spending at least some of their winters on the football pitches of Dublin, in a slightly more urban setting than we previously thought!

Curlews in a slightly more urban setting than we're used to (Conn O'Brien)