Halswell Quarry 19 March, a Blackbird Day

 We had a very pleasant morning under a grove of old pear trees this morning. Americans have a saying about "A Bluebird Morning" ours was rather a "Blackbird Morning" or more like  a Brown-bird one. All except 1 bird was a Blackbird and as all except one of them was a youngster so they were mostly Brown ones.

We were able to sex most of the juvenile Blackbirds by the colour of their tail.

There was a good keen group of us with Jan, Ruud, Della, Vanessa and her son Ewan. Ewen is a keen lad and hopefully we can get him a Level 1 permit so he can get some banding experience. Although we caught only 12 birds of 2 species it was pretty much as expected. Of the 11 Blackbirds caught all were new and all birds of the year. The other was a recap that had been banded exactly 2 years ago at the same site. It had also been recaptured about 500m away in the Japanese Garden part of the Quarry last December.

The only non Blackbird caught was a juvenile female Bellbird. Juveniles are rarely caught, this being only the second caught at the Quarry.

Ruud looking very pleased with "his Bellbird".

Halswell Quarry 2nd March - A few birds and then it rained

 We had a session at the Quarry on Wednesday morning. We started with marginal conditions, a light drizzle or as some would say more of a mizzle. Birds were caught at a reasonable rate for the first hour or so and then the rain became heavier. As the nets were getting wet the decision was made to pack up and call it a day.

We processed 11 birds of 3 species with 6 House Sparrows, 1 Dunnock and 5 Silvereyes. All were new except 1 Silvereye, this had been banded in 2019, recaptured in 2021 and now in 2022. All at the same site.

Latest Newsletter from the Banding Office

I have just received the latest BirdBanD newsletter from the Ne Zealand Banding Office, it's well worth a read. As well as Birdy Stuff there is Batty Stuff and a great Kakapo chase. It can be found at 16th edition of BirDBanD 

BirDBanD Feb 2022 (doc.govt.nz)

The Banding of Jerry the Falcon 10 Jan 22

 On Monday I had the privilege  of banding a NZ Falcon youngster named Jerry, it was originally named Gerry after the landowners Father but as it now appears to be a girl it had a name change. After a 2 hour drive we were met by Don the land owner and had a crossing of the upper Rakaia River. Fortunately in his big 4x4 which could cope with the journey.

After lunch we had 30min journey to the nest site which is underneath an old hay feeder. Amazingly the space that the nest is in is only about 24cm in this space the pair had constructed a substantial nest. This is unusual as most books state that the nest is usually just a scrape with little or no nesting material. Perhaps Falcons don't read these books.

The nest is under the left end of this old hay feeder.

The banding party was a bit of a family affair, Don my nephew, the landowner, two of my sisters, Margaret, Don's mother, another sister known as "Birdy Bev" and myself. When Don first found the nest, which was the result of very good observation skills and detective work, it contained 3 newly laid eggs.

16 Nov - newly laid eggs

When he next checked the nest a month later there was a newly hatched chick. No sign of the other 2 eggs, possibly broken or removed by the parents.

17 Dec - newly hatched chick

Ten days later he again checked it and there was a fat looking downy youngster. 

26 Dec - little fatty.

Photographing the nest was a matter of a quick look under thrusting his arm under the hay feeder taking a photo then getting away as quick as he could before the extremely protective mother could  make a direct hit.

The banding went extremely well, Don got the chick and we retired to the protection of the Landcruiser cab where we could band in relative peace.

10 Jan - Don making the hand over.

10 Jan - Jerry the Falcon at approximately 24 days of age

Jerry with her new bling

Cashmere Rd Thu 6 Jan - the rain came but the birds forgot

We had a session at the Cashmere Rd site Thursday morning. A week ago there was a huge flock of birds, mostly Starling, Blackbird & Song Thrush feeding on plums on several large trees. Unfortunately by the time we got over the New Year and subsequent holidays the birds had departed and we had a very poor catch rate. We only caught two birds a Blackbird and a Song Thrush, before it started to rain. We were packed up and on our way home by 10am.

It looks like the Blackbird had a close encounter with a predator as it was replacing four feathers on the right side of its tail.

The only highlight of the morning was that Rudd on his bike ride home spotted a dead Starling on the side of Cashmere Rd. Being a good birdman he checked it out and found that it was banded. The bird had been banded at the Halswell Quarry last September, so not very long and at about 1km not a great distance but still a good record.

Last Tuesday we did some more Pulus banding. We banded 3 more Kingfisher chicks from a nest in a retaining bank below the workshop in the Quarry and 3 Welcome Swallow chicks from an old concrete bunker behind the workshop.

The three Kingfisher youngsters. A much more even sized brood than the one last month.

Jan with her arm in the Kingfisher hole. Reminds me about a song about a Woodpecker hole

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One of the Welcome Swallow chicks

No recent Banding Sessions but some Pulus have new bling

 Although we have not had any organized sessions recently we have managed to band a number of youngsters.

Little Owl - Two banded in a nest box at the Cashmere Rd site These were eggs when we banded their mother a month or so ago.

One of the Little Owls held by a very Happy Bloke.

Starling - Three youngsters banded in a neighbour's nest box. They fledged on Christmas Eve, the second brood from this box this year.

Kingfisher - A brood of five banded at a property across the road from the Halswell Quarry. They also have fledged.

There was a huge difference in the development of the Kingfisher chicks, from well feathered to only just bandable.

Redpoll - Four were banded this morning at the Quaifers Rd Wetland.

Halswell Quarry, Japanese Garden - Thu 9 Dec

 On Thursday we had another session at the Quarry amongst the cherry trees in the Japanese Garden. This is the same site we were at last week which is not always a good idea as there is usually a drop in numbers in the second week. But as most of the fruit is now consumed we thought we would try.

We had a group of school children come and have their lunch near us and they showed a lot of interest in what we were doing.

Ruud doing what he likes best, Entertaining & Educating kids

It was a reasonably successful morning with 24 birds of 6 species processed, 20 were new with 4 recaps.

Species caught were -

Blackbird - 3 (1) a big drop from last week indicating that Blackbirds might not be as stupid as we think.

House Sparrow - 10 (2) a bit of an increase probably due to some wheat being scattered around in the previous few day, One of the recaps was banded Oct 2018, so a reasonable age.

Our first juvenile Sparrow for this spring/summer.

Greenfinch - 3 (0)

Silvereye - 2 (1) the recap was banded last week.

Song Thrush - 1 (0)

Dunnock - 1 (0)

Fantail - 1 (0) this was colour banded by Laura as part of one of her studies.

The Fantail getting its bling

The fantail with its bling plus a little royal purple