Bird ringing at Wicken Fen - a nostalgic look at the past.

I was amazed to find the old ringing reports from the Wicken Fen Ringing Group on line. This is where I undertook a lot of my early ringing training with my trainers Mike & Margaret Smith. I started training in September 1976 but the earliest report with my name in as a member is 1977.

Its hard to believe it was over 40 years ago! I got started as I'd found a birds leg with a ring on in an old abandoned shepherds hut (with cast iron wheels - that would have been valuable these days!) in our local woods. I contacted the BTO expressing an interest in ringing and before I knew it I was having my first taster session - one of the first birds we caught was a Kingfisher.

See here for links to the online reports from this era.

I've still got records of all the birds I ringed at Wicken Fen &  (Linneage Woods, Suffolk) - going back to 1976 and including Yellowhammer (5), Nightingale (1) and Turtle Dove (3). Birds that are now nationally scarce and that I haven't ringed since those early days.