Devon and Cornwall Wader Ringing Group

: 08 January 2025

High Tide 3.83m @ 09:26, Sunrise 08:15, Team meet time 06:30, Catch 09:20

The catch was split into three parts, with a recce on the morning of Friday 3rd January, catch set-up on the afternoon of Friday 3rd January, followed by a catch attempt on Saturday 4th January. Sunday 5th January, was selected as a reserve date in the event that the first catch attempt did not go to plan. The recce is a vital part of cannon netting. It is used to observe the number and behaviour of birds present during the tidal period. Based on this information, the best place to set the nets and the appropriate number and mesh size of the nets required to catch the target species can be determined.

High Tide 3.81m @ 18:33, Sunset 16:09, Rendezvous 15:00

Setting mist-nets on Exminster Marshes © AJ BellamyA team of 13 assembled at 15:00pm at RSPB Exminster Marshes to set around the RSPB lagoon field pools for the first mist netting session on the Exe for winter 2024/25

Weather conditions were good, 12 degrees with wind dropping through the afternoon to relatively still by dusk. A full moon that rose at dusk did mean it was a brighter session than ideal, in combination with a rugby game at Exeter Chiefs stadium leading to a very bright sky at catch time, before the moon then disappeared behind clouds. The water level in the pools was high and only accessible with waders.

With a young team, with an average age under 30, nets were set in one field, a 'T' over the water totalling 6 wader nets a set of 4 nets on the far left bund and a set of 2 extra superfine nets for Snipe set by Noah on and adjacent to the near pool. A total of 13 nets were set, starting at 15:45 and was all completed by 16:30.

High Tide 5.76m @ 17:42, Sunset 16:10, Team meet time 15:00

After a planned session at this new site in November was cancelled due to forecast strong winds and rain, a mixed experience team of eight assembled at Northam Burrows to set nets on Greysands Pool. We set seven nets across the shallow pool and along its shoreline. Birds are only attracted to this pool on the highest of tides, when the saltmarsh in thre Skern is completely covered. Although this was the highest tide of this full moon sequence it did not make as much as predicted and only a few birds made use of the pool to roost. Although the full moon was obscured by heavy cloud for most of the time, the wind was stronger than ideal with some light drizzle. This combination of factors meant that we did not catch, and as the tide receded we packed up efficiently and were off site by 19:15. We are optimistic that in better conditions and with a slightly higher tide we would be able to catch at this site in the future.

Thanks are extended to Mike Day at Northam Burrows Country Park for arranging permission and allowing out-of-hours access.

Aims

The aims of the Devon and Cornwall Wader Ringing Group are to study the wading birds that live in, or pass through, Devon and Cornwall.

We hope to undertake fieldwork approximately once a month, mainly at weekends, involving either mist-netting or the use of a cannon net. Members of the group live across Britain, although many are based in Devon. A key site for fieldwork is the Exe Estuary and in particular Dawlish Warren National Nature Reserve, where we have a project on colour ringed Oystercatcher.

Birds are marked with individually numbered metal leg rings and, to aid relocation without the need to recapture them, with colour rings. Under special license we are also fitting GPS tags to a small number of birds to help understand the way they use the habitats around the estuary through the winter and at different states of the tide.

Links

The Dawlish Warren Recording Group publish regular updates on the birds seen at Dawlish Warren.

The county bird clubs are Devon Birds and the Cornwall Bird Watching and Preservation Society.

Bird ringing in Britain is licensed and coordinated by The British Trust for Ornithology. More information on why we ring birds and why we use colour marks on our study species can be found here. Bird ringing in Europe is coordinated by EURING.

The definitive database of all colour-marking schemes for waders in Europe and the East Atlantic flyway is available on the International Wader Study Group website. All editions of their publications (Wader Study, Wader Study Group Bulletin and International Wader Studies) are available online.

For species other than waders the European colour-ring Birding website, voluntarily maintained by Dirk Raes, should be useful.

Policies

Data Protection Policy

Join us

The group welcomes volunteer ringers from anywhere who are interested in taking part in the fieldwork, although membership of the group is open to all, whether or not you hold a bird-ringing license. Please bear in mind that we need to have a good balance of experience across the team for each session, but we do our best to accommodate and train the less experienced.

The current membership fee is £5 per year, running from November to October. You can register and join here.

Acknowledgements

The group operates with the excellent support of Teignbridge District Council and Devon Wildlife Trust as landowners of Dawlish Warren. Warren Golf Club kindly allow access across their land.

We are also grateful to he RSPB and David King for allowing us to operate on their land at Exminster Marshes and to Torridge District Council for co-ordinating permissions at Northam Burrows.

The value of the projects would not be fully realised without the excellent re-sighting work undertaken and publicised by the Dawlish Warren Recording Group.

We are grateful to Natural England for funding the rings and GPS tags, and for providing staff time for ongoing management of the projects. We are also grateful to the Game and Wildlife Conservation Trust (GWCT) for staff time for fitting the GPS tags, organising the project and dealing with data. Devon Birds have generously provided some funding for colour rings.

Header images on this website are licensed under the Creative Commons license by the photographers.