A farm in North Norfolk, another field another Quail - 5th July 2026

 Back again for another few hours in the evening. With temperatures set to raise again, this seems the most sensible and efficient way to ring birds at the moment. The last few morning sessions ended with around 20 or so birds for an early start, 6 hours in the field and taking down between 11am and midday was still uncomfortably warm. This way it's around three hours if we have the energy at the end of the day, start at 7pm and have the nets down as it's getting dark.

We set an 18m in the wood and brought that in for 9pm. Tried the field across the track this time and a double by the barn where we base ourselves. We saw a Quail in flight as we set the single, and eventually, just as we were about to pack up got a male in the double net. This evening we also heard a female calling, so there are no less than three birds in this relatively small area. We've also heard birds calling from other fields around our house, confirming this as an exceptional year for Quail in Norfolk.

Male Quail

A lot of the cereal crops in this part of Norfolk look ready for harvesting early, although extremely short stemmed. One of our farmers tells us that they usually expect to harvest in mid to late July, and the crop condition is a result of the weather, with much of the crop dead. I've noticed that the grains look very small and the harvest will not be a good one. Hopefully the birds using the fields will have time to move out before harvesting. The birds at this site can sometimes be heard in adjacent uncultivated fields with rank vegetation so they are quite mobile.

Juvenile Whitethroat

Total: 10

Blackcap - 3
Blue Tit - 1
Chiffchaff - 1
Quail - 1
Whitethroat - 4