Mist Netting the Shakerley Sand Martin Colony!

Sunday 19th June and we were still out ringing.. The summer ringing activities just never stop for us so in the evening, myself, Kane and Gillian joined Steve Christmas at the Shakerley Sand Martin Colony.

We set up 2 nets for just 1 hour, resulting in a good catch of 38 birds. More interestingly, when Gillian extracted the first bird out of the net it was wearing a Cempa Sea, Lisboa ring from Portugal - A310342!

We also controlled another bird - BTO L451555.

A few hours later, we were greeted with some fantastic news! The bird A310342 was the first Portugese ringed Sand Martin to be recovered back in the UK!!

Photographed by Kane Brides

Funnily enough, this bird was actually ringed by ringers from the North - West; Tom and Peter Fearon from Merseyside had ringed this bird on 21/8/10 at Reserva Natural das Lagas de Santo Andre e da Sancha in Portugal! It was aged as a juvenile (3) and weighed 14.8 grams!

Map by Kane Brides

A fantastic end to a ridiculously busy week!