Long Time no KAB

This morning, Simon, Mette and I went ringing at Kabeltromlen again after not having been there for ten days. We used today for an opportunity to train me for C-license. There were surprisingly many birds in the nets and a great variety of species. Overall a lot of first calendar year birds (birds hatched this spring). My personal highlight was for sure the Crested Tit (Topmejse), because it was my first time seeing this fantastic bird in hand. We also had a juvenile Common Redstart (Rødstjert).

1K Crested Tit (Topmejse)

1K Common Redstart (Rødstjert)

The ringing area has changed a lot since I was last there: The young, green reeds have grown a lot, and the water has receded, it’s mostly mud now, and there’s only a few puddles of water left; soon the waders won’t be needed anymore. Simon left us for the last round, because he has to go to Germany today. As Mette and I were closing nets, the Cinereous Vulture (Munkegrib) was suddenly called out as moving northeast – just in our direction! It has been reported from further south earlier in the morning, but now it was coming closer and closer according to many messages on Zello. After we were finally back from closing round – I almost stressed out a bit – we immediately scanned the area with our binoculars. Only we could not find the big vulture, although others had seen it at Grenen not long before. Since we had quite many birds waiting, I decided we must process these first. At some point, I randomly turned around while still having a Great Tit (Musvit) in hand – and there it was! The giant, dark bird slowly flew past us in that exact instant! It came very close, before moving southwest towards Ellekrattet, and we had amazing views on it, way better even than what we experienced yesterday. Incredible. We now also received the data from the Spanish ringing centre, after having read the vulture’s ring number from photos and reporting it. Now we know it was ringed as a chick on 30th May 2023 at Rascafría near Madrid.

Map showing where the Cinereous Vulture (Munkegrib) was ringed, and where it has been reported in Denmark. The distance between Skagen and Rascafría in Spain is over 2.140 kilometres!

At 10:20, we were done with ringing and biked back to the station. After a little nap, I spent most of the afternoon with making the station fresh and ready, and preparing everything for the two summer volunteers who would arrive today. Brian from California arrived in town at 16:30, Mette picked him up. Welcome to the station! After getting everything settled, we went out, and I got to show him around in the area. On our walk he got his first four lifers already. After that, I went for a little grocery shop to make dinner later. Juliane, the second new volunteer from Germany, had a lot of trouble with her trains unfortunately, and ultimately was delayed until 00:20. But in the end she finally made it, and that’s what matters! I’m looking forward to having a great time with this new team!

People: Julian Helbig, Simon S. Christiansen, Brian Browne, Juliane Rößler, Mette Breede