A Twite catching session this morning saw John Mason and myself on the North Harbour Wall at around 07.15 to set up the whoosh net. Although the temperature was just above freezing, the 15 mph wind made it feel extremely cold.
A single net launch resulted in a catch of 39 Twite (27 retrap, 1 control & 11 new birds) and two new plus one retrap Goldfinch. The retrapped Twite were all recently ringed except for two - all were recorded but not processed in view of the conditions. The control bird was wearing a BTO metal ring on the right leg, but no colour rings. Two birds with metal only rings have been here for a while now and we have been hoping to catch them.
Following this burst of activity it was decided, in view of the lack of any feeling in the fingers and toes and the light snow flakes falling, to retire to the Nature Reserve hut to recover.
It is known that Machrihanish bird obs. did ring a few birds with metal only in autumn 2012 so we were half expecting these two to be part of that catch, although the ring series was not similar to others they used in that period .
Machrihanish have been contacted by email and we await a reply.
ajd
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