Our last two mornings at the site, and now more chance to do some ringing as only two trainee ringers remain at the gite.
We continued to drop nets well in advance of dawn, hence the first round at 7am or just before tended to be rather short of birds. On the 28th we only got 54 captures of 10 species in all, only 27 Sedge Warblers and no Aquatic Warblers. Great Reed Warbler being the best capture with a few Bluethroat, mainly retrapped individuals.
In the evening the number of Sand Martin overhead looked very promising, but those birds drifted away and the eventual roost catch consisted of 19 Swallow and 7 Sand Martin.
Our last day and the ringing team was Frederic, Gilles, Paul and ourselves. The numbers had improved and there were 138 captures including 81 Sedge Warbler, 2 Wryneck and an Aquatic Warbler. This was our third trip to France hoping to ring Aquatic Warbler and this time we succeeded. Both of us ringed 2 new birds, my last being today.
We enjoyed our time with the project. Anyone thinking of applying to join the efforts should bear the following in mind -
These efforts are run primarily as training exercises and anyone coming up to their exam will ring all the time. Trainees have little chance to ring and are given priority during sessions. There are paid staff members and sometimes they will also ring every round. There are only three people ringing at any one time as data in recorded straight onto laptop. There were several days when neither of us ringed. We are limited as to the help we can offer to trainees at the net as methods are quite specific, for example extraction using the legs primarily, is not allowed any longer and trainees are taught to clear the wings first. Most of the time we were there for extracting and there were not any particularly high volume days. Most of the ringers at the station spoke English, or had a little English. We used French when we could including during giving data.
Many thanks to Frederic and the team for making us welcome to join their Aquatic Warbler efforts. The sites are fantastic with great species of birds passing through.