As usual the moth trap had been put out the night before and some of the species were photographed before the first birds were brought in. There were a couple of moths i had not seen or photographed before so that was a good start.
Derek with the largest catch of the dayThe first batch of birds had a few of the commoner species normally caught but amongst them were a pair of great spotted woodpeckers, with one of them making an absolute din.But lovely looking birds up close in the hand.
Nearby to some of the nets the owners, Roger and Poppy, owned some meadow land and with a couple of small ponds it proved to be great for all sorts of wildlife. A pair of kingfishers were seen and heard when checking nets so Derek and a couple of us set up some mist nets in the hope of catching one. And on the way back to the house some marbled white butterflies were spotted .
There seemed to be good numbers of gatekeeper butterfly along with ringlets and meadow brown, with just one or two small skippers present. The grass areas bordering the hedge lined wooded area seemed to be teeming with small frogs and toads. There must of been several hundreds nearing a thousand, they were everywhere.
RingletSmall Skipper
With it being a special bird to ring it was duly photographed firstly in poppy's hand and then in my Sarah's, sarah loves all wildlife and birds especially but would not hold one, except for the barn owl i kept some time ago. And the same as some other species of bird when it was laid on its back it calmly stayed there not in any way wanting to move. On returning the kingfisher to where it was caught to our amazement the second kingfisher had also been trapped.
Wren
As the day drew on the number of different robin individuals rose over a remarkable 50 birds and the second ever lesser whitethroat was caught and ringed too. Where the kingfishers had been released there were a couple of dragonfly around, one being an emperor and the other a brown hawker which earlier had gotten caught up in a mist net. Myself and derek untangled it and a few choice words came from me before i let derek free it. The bite on those things bloody hurts, as derek found out as the last wing was freed.
Robin