It had to be a shorter session than usual at Billinge this morning because I had an appointment to go to but it turned out to be interesting nevertheless. There weren't many thrushes moving but over 2,000 Woodpigeons were counted going south by 9:00am (per CAD). A single Brambling was the first of the autumn and another or the same was heard again later. There were no warblers, not even a Chiffchaff, but Goldcrests found their way into the nets at regular intervals and a total of 13 were ringed. A couple of Sparrowhawks livened things up with a 1cy male being caught first and a 2cy female being caught in the same net an hour later. Catching 2 Sparrowhawks in the same session doesn't happen very often but the 3 previous occasion it has happened have all been in mid October like today's double act. The lively theme continued when a rather feisty Jay was caught and it did its best to take lumps out of me, as they usually do. The last net round produced a group of 5 Lesser Redpolls and, interestingly, 4 of the 5 were adult males which continues the predominance of adults in the Redpolls caught so far this month.
![1cy male Sparrowhawk, © P J Alker](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgfS41vw2Q9c_aEfS7Eh04LamvjQWj6ttGp1pV_VUX1bTznoBuM7HgtQz6PPX9PreKahElcRZV_5lOPkkrrfxhcFUxtbsY1sH805P6aKQ5jfK5n2QE_Z7eG6ID8QwCpU_-Vud4CCZ3p4NQ/s280/20181015_085746+%25282%2529.jpg) |
1cy male Sparrowhawk |
![1cy male Sparrowhawk, © P J Alker](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgEulSwUheC0_jXBfY6imXtkaTOWkNTu8zK1Ux6DZAVU4KyzBp8NHJpd3zxZuTmRTKw80pSAlu2Ee3WF08T9_UXZ7a5-LI3SFrBkzfEaZGpoDR1mOyy6entwhi2eBqqvIQEludclaIWZwI/s280/20181015_085944+%25282%2529.jpg) |
1cy male Sparrowhawk |
![2cy female Sparrowhawk, © P J Alker](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgC9JKAOOuMKI3RCBS2vjyrZPLlxLVLgFXEZOXmOqGWpUAda_VIcUn9qmx7YcpbAkEzALp62z1o_XGSnDUPkMZj0tmbaIlbG0f0qf9nVdqNR2MWnQ6NVgPh4bE_dwZvvoskpzu4Nr97Aj4/s280/DSC_0540ED.JPG) |
2cy female Sparrowhawk |
![Accretion on claw of 2cy female Sparrowhawk, © P J Alker](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiNNvMLM-dc1EQI7CXj8PQh0PfMRX7R1iX_eF6sZGtfu6f15YiE_2MsI7xwLczQIKD3MRCl-NQ9U2uwJfHgllaCqswpnPXidcqFGU4S0ak-QhBRhF1cUvecfe0xdkNfUReu_5SR9QZ1xUw/s280/DSC_0537ED.JPG) |
The female Sparrowhawk had an unusual and very hard accretion on the tip of one of its claws. I have never seen anything like this before and have no idea what could have caused it.. |
Ringing totals (retraps in brackets) for 15.09.18 were: Sparrowhawk 2; Jay 1; Coal Tit 2, Blue Tit 1; Great Tit 1; Goldcrest 13; Blackbird 1; Song Thrush 3 (1); Bullfinch (2); Lesser Redpoll 5. Total 29 new birds and 3 retraps.
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