A Bullfinch Morning

Paid our first post breeding season visit to Jerry and Barbara's woodland edge garden. With just two short nets we caught 50 birds. We expected to catch young tits and of  25 tits caught only one was an adult. We also caught 3 young Nuthatch which is great for our colour ringing study of this species.

 The big surprise though was Bullfinch, we caught 11, especially when you consider that  we only caught seven over the  previous 12 months! Interestingly only one was a juvenile, the others were adults including four we had ringed before. One of these had been ringed as a juvenile almost three years previously. Does this mean that Bullfinch have had a poor breeding season, or that juveniles do not visit feeders at this time of year? Future visits may  throw light on the situation.
John