Rings read!

It was a bit like Groundhog day yesterday. I found myself drawn to the Bean Geese again with sunny weather giving me a hope that I could read some collars. Finding the geese and at close range is of course a necessary prerequisite and I had a good start and succeeded in finding them. A favoured autumn field held 68 birds but they were very nervous. Through the scope I could see some collars but the sun was causing glare off the metal and I could not read them. When I was 400m away with woodland behind me (so I thought I was using fieldcraft..) the flock flew off. I cannot be sure that I scared them but they seem to be ultra nervous this autumn.

The flock flew off north to the peat bog so I headed south to the river so see if there were more birds there. And there were - 49 Taiga Beans with a Greylag for company were tucked up against the bank whilst over 500 each of noisy Greylags and Canadas were in the middle of the river. When they were on the river I could see one bird had a GPS collar and when they after half an hour flew off north my pictures show there was another bird with a collar. This bird in the company of the Greylag and another Bean then left the flock and flew back south over me before gaining great height and eventually heading north.
It was as always fascinating seeing how there are sub groups within sub groups amongst this small population.

I saw the GW Egret again on the way back but it was even more distant than the previous day. Raptors showed quite well today including my first juvenile Marsh Harrier of the autumn - it seems to have been a bad year for this species with few records (also few Hen Harriers and no Pallids).

Taiga Bean Goose T8. Tagged 9.10.2015 in Scotland and noted by me on migration every year since

T8 together with another Bean and a Greylag. Note the paler underwing of Greylag

note the very differet upperwing and rump pattern of the 2 species

the yellow ring on left leg identifies this bird as 04 who received the ring and GPS collar on 07.10.2013 but this was a retrap of a bird with a normal collar so the bird had first been ringed either in 2011 or 2012 and is therefore one of the oldest birds. The GPS collar no longer works but due to the ring I have been able to note the bird every year

the first flock. They are closer to the road than me but it is not a road you can stop along making them difficult to observe

the other flock resting on the river

the many hundred Greylag and Canada Geese also resting on the river sat midstream

The Great White Egret - I had initially assumed the white spot a long way out was a swan...

here are the 2 Bean and single Greylag Goose flying far higher than I have never noted from the geese before. Here they are heading back north to join the rest of their flock but I think they may originally had thought of heading south and continuing their migration