Halswell Quarry Friday 22 July - A couple of old birds

Our planned session at the Quarry on Wednesday was abandoned due to rain. It had already been raining almost every day for the previous week and continued until around midday Friday. As I wanted to collect the feeders for use in next weeks proposed session at the Cashmere Rd site I went down Friday afternoon to pick them up. Just to make some use of the trip I erected a net and was surprised by a steady flow of birds especially as the feeders hadn't been topped up since Tuesday and one had mysteriously disappeared. 

In less than 2 hours I caught 21 birds of 5 species with 17 new and 4 recaps. 

Species caught were- (recaps in brackets)

Blackbird - 1

Fantail - 1

Silvereye - 10 (2) Both the recaps were banded this year.

House Sparrow - 4 (1) The recap was banded Aug 2019 and at 1079 days from banding is a reasonably old bird for a Sparrow.

Bellbird - 1 (1) Both birds were male and were caught together. The new bird was a youngster and was possibly being hassled by the older banded one. The recap was banded June 2019 and is now at 1128 days from banding our oldest Bellbird recaptured.

The Bellbird showing the red eye of an older bird.

All the recaps had been banded at the Quarry, in the Conservation Area, which as a bird flies is only a short distance.