With perfect ringing conditions forecast, there was only one thing to do. Up and out, and opening nets in the half light at 04:45. It was a magical morning, still, bright and with a hint of autumn in the air. Most exciting of all, we drove through actual puddles (remember them?) on the way to the obs. at 04:30am, a Hedgehog was wandering across the road in the village (a rare sight!), two Barn Owl were hunting over the grazing marsh as we drove up the track and a Natterjack Toad was slowly wandering across the main Obs path.

A majority of birds were caught along the east bank today, with good numbers of Sedge (13) and Reed (9) Warbler still on the move. There were other migrants about too, with Whitethroat (3), Lesser Whitethroat (1), Blackcap (3), Chiffchaff (3) and Willow Warbler (1) caught. Around 08:30, a large group of 45 Swallow arrived and began feeding low over the water, allowing us to catch 11 of them, including an individual completely lacking any red in the throat. Other birds caught included Great Tit (1), Wren (2), Robin (3), Blue Tit (10), Coal Tit (2), Dunnock (3) and Cetti’s Warbler (1). In total we processed 66 birds, 44 new and 22 retraps – excitingly we are now adding our ringing totals onto Trektellen (in due course we will be adding all our ringing data from 2026) and the report from today can be seen here –https://www.trektellen.org/count/view/6101/20260817

Whilst we had the nets open, the sound of Greenshank, Green Sandpiper and Common Sandpiper could be heard from the Broad Water, a few Whimbrel flew over and two Spoonbill were on the scrape from the hides. The Otter was seen again from the main obs path, and a juvenile Water Rail was also present along east bank, whilst a few Bearded Tit were pinging away from the reeds. In the dunes, the Wheatear was present for its second day, and a Clouded Yellow was spotted. On the sea over the high tide, there was a female Eider.

The moths traps were a bit quieter today, but with a couple of rather nice ones, including Antler Moth and a migrant Scarce Bordered Straw (which I need to add to the list!). A picture of the full moth list is below.

Bee was also able to open some nets at Walsey today, catching a nice selection of birds including 1 Wren, 1 Goldcrest, 4 Blackcap, 4 Whitethroat, 1 Blue Tit, 5 Dunnock, 4 Blackbird and 1 Chaffinch.

Shannon