Some Little Owl & Harrier Banding, mostly in Rehab.

Yesterday Ruth and I drove down to Timaru to band some Raptors that are in Rehab awaiting release back into the wild. The main purpose of the trip besides banding the birds was to help with the banding training of two of the women who assist with the birds' care. The two women, Jenni & Angie are very comfortable handling these birds and are picking up Banding very quickly and competently.

We banded eight birds in total, 5 Little Owls and 3 Harriers. The number of Little Owls I find amazing, we had a total of 9 birds in a large flight enclosure. 3 had already been banded and are waiting release. The other 6 were meant to be all banded but one bird avoided us. They are experts in zooming from one of the many hidey-holes to another and it was almost imposable to track individual birds, so to avoid undue stress we left the one without bling.

A couple of the Little Owls were showing clear indications of being in their first year. This one has two moulted primaries with the outer ones being browner juvenile feathers

This one still has the brown outer coverts of a young bird

Angie holding a bird while Jenni does the deed.

The three Harriers had come from as far afield as Twizel, Fairlie and Waimate. We were very fortunate to have 2 Vets with us both of whom are very interested in the care of wild birds. Both are very competent in handling them, and although they don't band it was great to discuss aspects and ideas about the practice.

The Timaru folk tend to use some Falconry techniques, probably due to a couple of their members being keen on Falconry.

Angie watching while Jenni bands one of the Harriers which is held by Zoe, one of the Vets.

A couple of the Harriers were old birds with very pale yellow eyes.

After the banding was done we were invited to participate in a BBQ including Fallow Deer sausages and a cold beer before starting our journey home. 

Wild bird catching

I have twice set the traps in attempts to catch Harriers in the last few weeks. The first was a bit of a disaster. I went out with high hopes to find that at least 3 birds had been let out by someone  unknown. Unfortunately by the way the traps had been moved about the birds would have been very stressed before being released.

The second attempt was a little more successful and although only one bird was caught it was our first recapture. It was great to be able to check the condition of the colour band which was, except for being a bit dirty, in good condition. This is the first time this particular type of band has been used in NZ as far as I know.

The bands of the recap still looking good, but only after 25 days. Hopefully we can check them again in a year or two.

Queenstown - the last banding for the year

I have had a couple of sessions down here since the last post. An afternoon session at the stream and a morning session near the house.

Stream 29 Dec

Caught a similar number of birds as the previous session a bit different species list. A total of 26 birds of 6 species all except 2 new.
Redpoll 12, but still no recaps.
Greenfinch 7, the larges number caught here in a session.
Dunnock 3 and 1 recap.
Yellowhammer and Goldfinch 1 each and 1 House Sparrow recap.

House 31 Dec

Banded or recaptured 29 birds of 5 species with 19 new and 9 recaps.
Blackbird 1 new and a recap
Song Thrush 1 new juv.
Silvereye 1 new.

I got a surprise to find the Silvereye already starting to moult

House Sparrow 10 new and 9 recaps. Also caught and released unbanded about 20 - trying to ration my bands.
Tui 3 new, 2 old males and 1 younger female.

One of the big males

Bellbird 2 newly fledged juveniles. At the time of banding I was not sure of the sex but looking at the photos it looks clear.

Juvenile male Bellbird?

Juvenile female Bellbird?

I wish you all the best for 2018 and we will see what and who we can catch up with.

Zoo Stream Friday 9 Jan - First banding for 2015

Ross and I had a very successful session at the stream over the fence from the Zoo this afternoon. The stream at the moment is actually just a series of small puddles but birds find them enticing. We caught a total of 69 birds of 9 species with 59 new and 10 recaps. Surprisingly several birds were found to have already started primary moult.

The first bird caught in 2015 - a Greenfinch recap.

Species caught were - (Recaps in brackets)
Blackbird - 3 (0)
Dunnock - 1 (0)
Chaffinch - 12 (1) the recap was banded at the Prince of Wales Park in March 2013 and is now the oldest recaptured bird banded there.

One of the Chaffinch had started to moult its primaries.

Goldfinch - 14 (1)
Greenfinch - 10 (4) One of the recaps originally banded in Dec 2009 is the oldest Greenfinch we have recaptured in the last couple of years.

We caught our first juvenile Greenfinch for the summer - Juvenile on right compared to adult on left

House Sparrow - 1 (1)
Silvereye - 14 (3) The oldest recap was banded in July 2008 so is a reasonably old bird. Interestingly although banded at the Zoo this is the first time it has been recaptured.

Several of the Silvereye had also started their moult.

Grey Warbler - 1 (0)
Fantail - 3 (0)