February 2013 - More Brent Geese and other rings.

February 2013

More Brent Geese and other things.

February 2013 started with nice Great Black Backed Gull complete with Darvic at Bullock Harbour.

Great Black Backed Gull Blue[1MN] White. 03/02/2013

I've started labelling my darvics what appears to be best practice internationally.  As there are now so many projects ongoing, they are being very specific in the description of the ring and it appears CR Ringing is trying to introduce guidelines.  New schemes all seem to be four alpha numeric codes.  For Black Headed Gulls, each country appears to have a unique feature - Norway begin with J, Holland E.  Ireland it suggests all should begin with a 2.  So the Black Headed Gull 217G complies with these guidelines.  Older schemes can continue until they have run out of combinations.  Some new schemes are using different coloured letters. .  So [Colour][Code][Font colour]. = Blue[1MN]White.  Some schemes have introduced Colons : between letters. Yellow[T:015]Black is a Scottish gull.  All very confusing, but worth remembering to record Font Colour as well as ring colour.

3SBB - Brent Goose, Blackrock Park, Co Dublin

I started reporting Brent last month and continued on in February.  I assumed that they would be heavily reported, but I was the first person to report 3SBB this winter.

JBWR - Brent Goose, St Olafs GAA, Dublin

Linnet with coloured ring

I got very excited when I noticed a linnet with a coloured ring in my garden.  This was the 3rd false alarm this winter as it turned out to be a closed ring and identifies the bird as an escapee.  I had a Goldfinch with a blue closed ring and a Redpol with a plain red ring already.

Sandymount Roost.16th February 2013

I did try Sandymount Strand several evenings where thousands of gulls roost - as well as thousands of other types of birds, but no coloured rings and no Darvic rings seen.

TAWR - Brent Goose, Portmarnock

UBRY - Brent Goose, Portmarnock

I recorded 9 Brent in February.  Trying to get a photo of both rings at the same time, meant I ended up with a hundred + photos at the end of each trip.  They are delighted to get every single Brent report, but as you report more they request that it is submitted in an exact format, so they can upload them without having to retype everything.  This included trying to find the exact site code from the 1000+ sites the Brent are known to use.

DBSFNO is the code for Sandyford/Naomh Olaf GAA Pitches.  This is because part of the Brent study is how site faithful these birds are.

 I was also given my Brent reporting name! GPR.

I have received a notice of a Brent Capture and Ringing week with a request for volunteers.  Booked a day of work and looking forward to it!

Graham