Saturday, Easter weekend and
we woke to the faint patter of rain on canvas and the dawn chorus of birds. Quietly,
so as not to disturb slumbering parents, we dressed, left the caravan and
headed out into the early morning light to meet with local ringer Tony Cross.
Heading north we drove into
the rugged landscape of North Wales through sweeping valleys, along twisting
roads and past reddish, brown and green mountains with occasional patches of brilliant
white snow, a reminder that its not quite summer yet. After an hour we had
arrived in a beautiful woodland, with moss covering fallen trees and ancient
walls, browned leaves crackling softly under foot. Here, amongst the hornbeam
and beech, Tony has a feeding site for a rather special woodland bird… the
hawfinch.
A rather large, beautiful
finch with a huge bill, capable of cracking opens cherry stones, the hawfinch
is another British bird that has undergone a large-scale decline since the
1940s. Tony’s project involves colour ringing adults to try and increase sightings
of this species which is usually very difficult to catch.
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| A beautiful male Hawfinch, complete with colour ring |
The weather was perfect, the
earlier rain having ceased and the sky cloudy with only occasional bursts of
sunshine sparkling through the trees. Birds were dropping down readily to the
food covering the ground, and on take off flying directly into our nets.
Our task was then to extract
them from the net, ring and measure them, all the while avoiding that powerful
beak! Easier said then done!
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| An equally beautiful female hawfinch...check out that bill though! |
In total we caught 21
hawfinches, all of which were given a uniquely numbered metal ring and a colour
ring. A huge thanks must go to Tony for such a superb day’s ringing and for
giving us the opportunity to get up close, and in some cases a little too
personal (well my fingers think so anyway!) with these amazing and beautiful
birds.
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| And so to the pain..... and boy does it hurt when these guys get hold of you! |
You can follow Tony’s
ringing activities at his Blog also!
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