July - week 4, with RAS season ended.

The forecast became unsettled again, but Sunday 26th seemed promising, with a low chance of showers from mid morning. It turned out to be just one shower (at 11am), so Jerry had a reasonable "extra CES" session, though a bit on the quiet side. As he was joined by Andy and Peter/Ted for parts of the session, there was plenty of opportunity to do some net lane trimming, and some other small tasks. The catch was just 14 + (8), made up of Wren 1, Robin 1, Song Thrush (1), Blackbird 4 + (4), Chiffchaff 2 + (1), Blackcap 5 + (1), Reed Warbler (1) and Long-tailed Tit 1. Although the "thrush catch" has picked up a bit recently (though still in single figures), tits have been virtually absent, so the results of our CES, in a month's time, will be interesting.

Some more settled weather (though a bit sunny), for the end of the month saw a push to complete final RAS visits. On Wednesday 29th, Carlton was at the jetty, for a very quiet 4 hours, with just 4 + (2) birds caught. Jerry was in rb2 for a slightly better 12 + (6). Peter was in rb2 on Thursday, for a very similar catch of 11 + (5), plus this Southern Hawker (below), the first one caught this season, and safely extracted from the net (Carlton had a Hobby catching "less fortunate" dragonflies at the jetty the previous day). On Friday Andy was at the jetty - 14 ringed (incl a Whitethroat), and George was in rb2 - 11 + (6), incl a Kingfisher, a control Sedge Warbler, and 2 more Reed Warbler for the RAS.

Southern Hawker

The total species mix for the two jetty sessions was Wren 1, Robin 1, Chiffchaff 2, Whitethroat 1, Blackcap 1, Reed Warbler 4 + (1), Sedge Warbler 5, Blue Tit 1 + (1), Great Tit 1 and Reed Bunting 1.

Whitethroat at Jetty

The three sessions in rb2 produced Kingfisher 1, Wren 1 + (1), Dunnock 2, Blackbird 3 + (1), Song Thrush 1, Chiffchaff 1, Reed Warbler 22 + (10), Sedge Warbler 2 + (1), Cettis Warbler (1), Blackcap 1 + (1), Blue Tit (1) and Reed Bunting (1).

Our second Kingfisher of the Year (and second of the month!), this photo demonstrating the remarkable response Kingfishers show when laid down, remaining completely still for a few short minutes, to the point that they can be weighed without flying off!

These sessions have concluded our RAS monitoring for this year, and a total of 38 different adult Reed Warbler have been caught (incl 21 ringed as young birds in 2019) - 8 at the jetty, and 30 in rb2. The July ringing total was 364, with YTD at 741. Much lower than is usual for this stage of the year, but reasonable, given the restrictions on most of us being able to visit.