Pied Flycatchers Have a Successful Season

In a year when many species have had a rather difficult season, due to the cold wet spring, it is great to be able to report on one species that to fledging at least has had a very successful season. Our RAS in the Lune Valley covers nest box schemes in 11 mainly upland oak woods. The population this year was 87 pairs, just five down on the record population of 92 in 2011. Of these 72 or 83% successfully produced year making it one of the best years since our study began. We ringed 427 nestlings with the average brood size at ringing being 5.8. We also caught 73 females and 38 males. Two of the males were proved to be feeding at two adjacent nest boxes. Many of these had been ringed in our nest boxes in previous years. Our oldest bird was V469347, ringed as an adult female in May 2007 so it is six years old at least. It has bred successfully every year in the same wood for the past six years although it has used four different nest boxes, all within ca 100 m of each other. It also has had different males each year. Almost all returning adults breed in the same wood in successive years although this year we had two move four km. A few of the birds ringed as nestlings return to breed in their natal wood, but most move just a short distance to another wood. Some though move further as shown by five adults we caught this year, these had been ringed as nestlings in Cumbria (2)Northumberland, Durham and Derbyshire. John