A Difficult Season

The poor weather with heavy rain and wind and the resulting high water levels has seriously curtailed our ringing efforts at Leighton Moss. Last year in the first half of July we managed 11 ringing sessions , this year we have managed only five. Average catch last year was 35- this year only 18. It is however early days at least for Reed Warblers although there appears to be fewer young around so far this year. Reed Warblers and Bearded Tits are our main study with an RAS done on both. Today we passed the 100 mark for adult Reed Warblers - by this time last year we had caught 137 and ended up with 236 for the year. Of these ca 50% are already ringed. To date we have only ringed 12 juvenile Bearded Tits about half last year total and there appears to be a higher breeding population this year. Todays star bird though was a juvenile Cetti's Warbler giving the first positive proof that this expanding species has finally bred successfully at Leighton Moss. For the past three years we have caught up to five birds in September/October but although they have wintered and males have sung in March they appeared to leave after that. This year possibly four males have been singing right through the spring. Will be interesting to see how many more we catch. John