Double Ringed Plovers

Today I went out to the beach where large numbers of seabirds had gathered off of the tip with hundreds of Common Terns, European Herring Gulls and Great Black-backed Gulls feeding offshore. Two of the large puddles towards the tip remained today a large flock of roosting gulls had about 90 Lesser Black-blacked Gulls in it which is a pretty high count for the roosting flocks this season.

I then went to Batteriskov to look for a singing Common Firecrest which had been heard the day before and by the others a little while earlier. It was quite easy to hear (if you can hear the high pitched sounds) but not so easy to spot as it mostly hung out high up in the conifers peeking out of the dark places time to time.

Common Firecrest (Rødtoppet Fuglekonge)

Common Ringed Plover (Stor Præstekrave)

In the afternoon we went to the beach again but this time to ring some ringed plovers to make double ringed plovers. We found some young Common Ringed Plover chicks and ringed them with steel rings so that the ring doesn’t corrode around the water, took some weight measurements and then handed them off to the awaiting Plover parents nearby.

After the plovers we went to take a look at the large roosting gull and tern flock on the beach where we managed to read a couple of colour rings and saw nine Black-legged Kittiwakes rooting on the beach with the Common Terns, Sandwich Terns an Common Gulls.

Tomorrow we will be back out at Skarvsøen for more CES ringing, last time there were many birds with eggs and young fledglings about so we will see how the breeding birds are progressing there!

Highlights

Common Firecrest (Rødtoppet Fuglekonge) 1

Black Kite (Sort Glente) 1

Common Tern (Fjordterne) 700

Observations from on area today on DOFbasen

Ringing: Grenen

Common Ringed Plover (Stor Præstekrave) 4

People: Cora Köberle, Tue Baaner, Hanelie Sidhu, Andrew Jacobs, Simon Sigaard Christiansen and Lisa Vergin