A Grey Chiff...

I can only apologies for how quiet this blog has been of late. I have had such little time for birding, and even less time for blogging!

Anyway, I thought it was about time I did pull my finger out, so....

Here's a few pictures I took of the grey Chiffchaff I saw in Mike Tyler's hand on Saturday morning at Colyford WTW. There is green in the mantle, which I guess alone would rule out pure/classic tristis? As you can see though, it is a very pale grey bird - the top two photos showing it alongside a collybita shows this well. Also note the lack of any yellow tones on the birds underparts.

What do you think...

The Yellow Wagtail - Trapped And Ringed

Our second ringing session at Colyford WTW since the probable Eastern Yellow Wagtail has been in residence proved a total success, because at 08:35 it flew in to one of our mist nets! RESULT!

Biometric data proves that this bird is indeed..... a Yellow Wagtail! So not much use at all! But what it left in my hand is probably going to prove of great use...

Yellow Wagtail poo!!

This - along with a couple of belly feathers it lost in the net - should secure the identification of this bird once and for all....eventually! Good old DNA :-)

I took loads of photos of various different parts of the bird - here's three of them...

All photos copyright Steve Waite

In the lower photo, note the strip of yellow-buff on lower breast/belly, and the smidgen of yellow-buff between its legs. All white under tail coverts though.

The other very useful thing it did was call - which to my ears sounded quite different to the usual spring and autumn flyover flavas. I managed to record seven calls, and the first comments back are very positive. Martin Garner is preparing some sonograms and these will appear on his blog, along with some comments from the man himself and the sound clip of this bird.... CLICK HERE

Wagtail aside, it was an excellent ringing session, with this stonking Water Pipit...

A beast!

And this stunning male Sparrowhawk...

Just look at that eye!

By 10am the Yellow Wagtail was back, feeding on its favoured filter bed. It was still there when we left at about 11:30am.