The berry bandit update.

The adult male Sparrowhawk continued to harass the Waxwings today and didn't let them settle in the garden for any length of time. It was seen on and off throughout the day but wasn't seen getting a kill. I suspect this will be a daily occurrence now until the Waxwings finally move on. Despite this unwanted attention the Waxwings still managed to eat most of the apples I had put out so they must have made the most of their more limited feeding opportunities.

Sparrowhawk on the look out for Waxwings.

The female Blackcap that I mentioned in yesterday's post was caught in the bird table trap this morning. This trap is a very simple manually operated cage trap which has an escape door that is closed when a string is pulled. She turned out to be quite fat weighing in at 20.2 g. This is around 3g above the average weight and she will be a wintering bird that is fattening up for her return migration to a breeding site somewhere in Europe.

Female Blackcap (Sylvia atricapilla).

And finally the berry bandit was out doing some more guerrilla pruning today but he also has a more honest streak and bought another 10kg of apples.

Berry bandit with his swag.