When you think of Tesco, the first thing you think of is probably not that it is a great location to ring birds. Anyway, that is the location of this post as Steve, Rachel, Chris and I headed to Tesco Extra in Bangor to try and net the Pied Wagtail roost.
Erecting a 40ft net right infront of the bush they roosted in, we soon started catching birds in the ever decreasing light and ended up catching 31 birds, which I would say was about 75-80% of the total roost.
Erecting a 40ft net right infront of the bush they roosted in, we soon started catching birds in the ever decreasing light and ended up catching 31 birds, which I would say was about 75-80% of the total roost.
adult male Pied Wagtail
above - [5] 2cy bird showing retained juvenile outer greater coverts, contrasting to the bold black and white adult feathers of the inner greater coverts.below - [6] adult male showing uniform black and white greater coverts (and black mantle showing it to be a male bird)
myself and 31 Pied Wagtails in hand...superb! (I personally ringed 9 birds)
Chris Bridge, 31 Pied Wagtails and Tesco Extra...surreal!
Hamza joined us before we extracted the birds from the net and witnessed the majesty of the black and white angels.This is one of the more memorable ringing sessions I have done so far, mainly because Pied Wagtails (particularly adult males) are such enchanting birds and very charasmatic birds both in the field and in hand.
Huge thanks go to Steve and Rachel for arranging the catch with the Tesco store manager and also for Tesco for letting us catch their birds!
No comments:
Post a Comment