A bit of garden ringing

We've had good numbers of Greenfinches and Goldfinches in the garden recently - flocks of 30+ for each! With the wind dropping at the weekend I put a mist net up in the garden to ring a few. Interestingly I've ringed quite a few Greenfinches and Goldfinches in our new garden with only a single re-trappped Goldfinches and no Greenfinches.

A lot of the Goldinches are still in full juvenile plumage suggesting the species has had a good breeding season with several broods. Others are more advanced and have almost completed their post juvenile moult.

Many of the Greenfinches have completed their post juvenile moults but some, like this juvenile female below, are still completing theirs - this bird is moulting all its greater coverts.

Great Tits seem to have fared better than Blue Tits locally and I'm catching more juveniles of the larger species. Most have almost completed their post juvenile moults with the majority having replaced their greater coverts already and actively moulting their tertials and tails.

Just as I was packing up a large 2nd calendar year female Sparrowhawk hit the net alongside my head causing an outburst of fairly choice language. It certainly made me jump! Luckily I soon recovered as it certainly wouldn't have stayed caught for long. My 2nd in this garden in the two years we've lived here. I wonder if this is the bird that predated one of our local Little Owls in the garden?

I had a new patch / garden tick at the weekend with a flyover Spotted Redshank heading towards the Dee estuary. The last new patch bird I had was a Sedge Warbler in the spring!