Change of weather and there were the birds. Whole week no bird calls when opening the nets in the dark, but now they were everywhere. Crazy first round, so we decided to call Hans to help getting the birds out and also Gert has helped us. First three hours was hard work, but that is where we come for. We had a Nattergal and a Rødrygget Tornskad. Probably a day record for the Rødstjert (41) and also very many Havesanger (54). 

In total we caught 323 birds (17 species) of which only 5 were recaptures:

In the picture gallery you find an impression of the first round and the other picture is a kind of quiz, which one is which. Hope you see the differences.

I do not know who made the bird bags but today we used them almost all. Thanks for the new ones.

I will go early to bed today, I am tired.

With kind regards

Robert

Today was again very quiet. We had 28 birds, but more than half of them were recaptures. We had a lot of visitors, a family of three and a larger group of about 25 people. Luckely we had some birds to show and to explain what we are doing here. 

The day started with some wind but quickly the wind became less. It looks like we get a weather chance and that is normally resulting in an influx of new birds. Lets hope that will be the case. Claus-Jannic and Nina are also here, so there are hands enough to handle some more birds.

In the afternoon we had time to do some other things and we made some nice pictures. You will find a few of them below. This time no birds but a frog and a duehale.

Catches and recaptures of today:

With kind regards

Robert

Today was again a day with too much wind and because there is not much bird migration going on and  hardly any new birds are arriving in the garden. We had to share 12 birds between about 15 persons. We had a visit of the "Staten Naturhistoriske Museum". The Ringmærkningscentralen is merged with another department and they were visiting us to show the new colleagues how birds are caught and how we handle them for getting the information we are searching for. It was a pity that the weather circumstances were not completely right.

In the picture gallery you can find one picture of Hans and Ramon who is showing a gaerdesanger, the two other pictures are of a gulspurv, which looks a bit fluffy. The reason for that is that the birds was moulting all over, see the picture of the wing. You see the brownish older outer primaries and the brownish secondaries and in the middle the nicely coloured fresh new primaries.

 Catches and recaptures of today:

With kind regards and I hope that the weather soon will change and we get a whole influx of new birds.

Robert

Again much wind and later some rain. But we opened the nets at six o`clock and had almost as many birds as yesterday, 25 birds and 16 species. We opened at some time the low nets at the pond and that brought a nice bird, see below.

Ramon and me are not the only bird ringers at this moment at the station, we have two helpers which are very keen to learn the the birdes and how to handle them. Jón from the Faeröer islands and Gail from the UK. Today you will find below a little introduction of Gail. Jón is a few days away, had to perform with his Finish Rock band in the US, but will be back on sunday. I will then ask him to introduce himself to you, but now first Gail Stride:

I’m a british ecologist and in the past have worked predominantly on trees - so this is my opportunity to fill in a big hole in my knowledge! I had my first experience of mist netting in Borneo where I was collecting data for my PhD, and was able to tag along with some of the other scientists out there working on understory rainforest birds, and later in Spain and Sweden with Ramón. I’m very excited to be here at Gedser for the next few months and want to learn as much as possible! Today I ringed my first bird at Gedser - a beautiful tree pipit (Anthus trivialis)!

As mentioned by her we caugth a Skovpiber/Tree Pipit at the pond (see picture):

Catches and recaptures of today:

With kind regards Robert

Again not such a busy day. We opened the nets at 6 o`clock and had in total today 26 birds and 16 different species. In the morning we had one little surprise, a little visitor from Sweden. It was a Kærsanger/Marsh Warbler. Dubble checking the ring number and taking pictures of the ring.  We closed the nets at 11.00.

In the afternoon we tried to catch at the pond Yellow Wagtails / Gule Vipstjerter in special low nets and by using the sound of the birds to attract them. During the morning and early afternoon we had seen several flocks migrating in the direction of Germany. And yes we were lucky, we caught three Yellow Wagtails. 

Picture of Yellow Wagtail 

Catches and recaptures of today:

With kind regards

Robert

Jeg har endelig modtaget mail om den spansk-mærkede løvsanger fra Gedser fanget 17. maj 2019
Kommer her:

This morning we found the Weather too bad to open the nets. There was a lot of wind, but also too much rain. That was a pity because a large group of school kids were going to visit the birdstation, and now we would not have many or any bird to showto  the group. In the end we were able to catch two birds for showing what we do at the birdstation, a Blackcap/Munk and a Redstart/Rødstjert. So 25 kids for one bird each. In total we ringed 4 birds and had one recapture.

But before the kids were arriving Hans came with a bird in a bag. The bird, which was a Merlin/Dværgfalk, was found inside the shelter at Gedser Odde where you can sit and eat your lunch. The Merlin had probably tried to catch one of the Barnswallows/Landsvale. By trying this it hit the window and could be picked up by one of the birdwatchers. The bird was a bit groggy but nothing was broken. They phoned Hans and he brought the bird to the station for ringing. Hans did the ringing and we did the measurements. It made Hans extremely happy because it was for him a new species that he was able to ring. After taking some pictures we released her and she was happely flying away. A nice surprise!! 

Some pictures of the Merlin/Dværgfalk:

Catches of today:

Not much was happening today. Garden was almost empty. We had hardly birds to show to a group of visitors, but Hans, Gert and Benny are very good in entertaining people. So everything went well. We had in total 19 birds. Wind was a little bit too much and out of the wrong direction.

Vagn and Susanne are back home I hope and I and John from the Faeröer have taken over. Hope we have more work in the next few days. Besides catching birds we have done some gardening, plants are not stopping yet with growing and getting bigger.

With kind regards Robert

Sidder nu hjemme ved køkkenbordet i Midtsønderjylland og skriver denne blog da det i dag var skiftedag, hvor Susanne og Vagn blev skiftet ud med Robert Luttik. Kursisterne og deres instruktører forlod ligeledes GFU, så jeg gætter mig til at freden har sænket sig over Gedser Fyrvej 4.
Vi spiste naturligvis aftensmaden alle mand ved bordene i haven i går aftes, men måtte søge indenfor ved 21.30-tiden da det begyndte at regne. Stor var min overraskelse faktisk i morges da jeg opdagede, at temperaturen da havde nået 25,5 grader Celsius ! Imponerende nattemperatur i Danmark. Mon det ikke er en form for rekord?

Dagen i dag bragte et par nye fugle i hvert fald for mig. Se nu denne stolte unge spanier, - den fugl havde han da vist ikke set komme:

 1K Ringdue (såre almindelig, men næsten aldrig fanget i net på stationen)

 Lidt senere kunne han præsentere en fin Sivsanger, som ligeledes var en ny ”røreart” for mig.

Ellers har fangsttallene i dag været yderst beherskede, men der var dog nok til at Søren og Carl Johan (de vordende ringmærkere) kunne have nok at arbejde med. De deltog egenhændigt i netopsætningen i morges kl. 5:20 og fik øvet sig i udtagning af fugle fra nettene samt mærkning og arts-, alders- og kønsbestemmelse. Det er da vist et par gutter vi kommer til at se mere til hernede!
Dette var så mine sidste ord i bloggen for denne gang. Jeg holder nu 4 ugers ”ferie” herhjemme i det Sønderjyske, men vender frygteligt tilbage sammen med Lars Ulrich Rasmussen om 4 uger. Vi glæder os allerede!

I dag var så første rigtige dag efter at kursisterne holdt deres indtog i går aftes. Desværre var der et par afbud så der var kun Søren og Carl Johan samt instruktørerne Henning og Lars Ulrich at sige godmorgen til kl. 5 i morges. Selvfølgelig var de alle klar til at bevæge sig ud i nattemørket og være med til at sætte nettene op.
Senere tildelte vi dem et par af de bedste net at holde øje med og vi (Ramón, Susanne og Vagn) passede så resten. Jesper Johannes fra Museet dukkede også op og deltog dagen igennem. Begge kursister fik i dagens løb mulighed for at arbejde ved nettene, både sætte dem op, lukning af net og selvfølgelig udtagning af fugle. Efterfølgende arbejdet i laboratoriet med håndtering, artsbestemmelse, mærkning, alders- og kønsbestemmelse, vægt og fedtvurdering.

Fik de så lov til at se og mærke noget spændende?
Joda, - allerede i første runde kunne jeg viderebringe en Lille Fluesnapper, som Ramón vist gerne ville have mærket og senere kunne Søren pille en Rødtoppet Fuglekonge ud af nettet. Alle fik de vist prøvet lidt af hvert, både de bøvlede fugle, som var svære at få ud af nettet og situationen med fuglen som ”smuttede” ud af fingrene! Åhja - det sker jo for os alle.
Kursisterne overtog så ”hele dynen” i 3 timer efter standardtiden og oplevede derfor hvor varmt der kan blive i labbet efter middagstid. De har også planer om at prøve lidt fangst her sidst på eftermiddagen igen. Vi får se !