Ladies' Day.

I call this "ladies' day" because of the number of female Blackcaps that I caught today at Priory. I didn't go early because of the dripping fog, but waited until 9 o'clock (BST). Most of the birds were caught during the next two hours whilst it was still rather "overcast". Thereafter, the sun appeared, albeit with fluffy, summer clouds.

Today's "bit of fluff".

A rather typical 'early autumn' day, with many of the migrants well on their way south, leaving just a few late broods to fatten up before taking off on their own migrations. There are other migrants from "up north" around but we don't get many of them here as they seem to prefer the Ivel valley (runs north-south) or the slopes of the Chilterns.

24 birds today wasn't a bad count - 50% Blackcaps was the main attraction. Put another way, six times more than were actually seen/recorded at the outset by my friend, DK.  Today's effort brought the total of new Blackcaps caught at this site this year to 71, just 17 short of last year's total, but a massive 36 short of the all-time winner, 107 in 1994!

Female Blackcap #415, wl 75.5mm, wt 21.8g, 1ogc, F3.5, M2. Today's fattest.

The full list for today comprised:
Chiffchaff - 2
Blackcap - 12, 10 of these were females!
C.Whitethroat - 1
Wren - 1
Blackbird - 1
Song Thrush - 1, (1)
Robin - 1, (1)
Dunnock - 2
Greenfinch - 1


Many of the young birds, other than the Blackcaps, were in early PJ moult and some had still not started.

 3JM Blackbird #080 in full juvenile livery.

The only adult birds were two of the female Blackcaps and a male Chiffchaff (with an abietinus call). The Common Whitethroat looked as good as any adult of the species.

Whitethroat #414 with juvenile eye colour, weighed in at 17.0g (F3,M1)