Ringing Report 2020

The Flamborough Bird Observatory (FBO) ringing group comprises the historical recording area east of the Dykes on Flamborough Headland together with operations at Bempton, mainly at Bempton Cliffs RSPB Reserve. The purpose of the ringing group is to gather data on wild birds, especially migrants, which are found in the FBO area. The secondary purpose is to assist in the training of people in the techniques of trapping, handling and ringing wild birds.

The ringing programme was severely interrupted by the Covid lock-down, meaning that people were not allowed to travel from their homes to ring birds and as a result there was no ringing on our public headland sites for a period of over 3 months, from march through to July. Fortunately, we have resident ringers Paul & Jenny Butterworth, in the village and Andy Hood out at Ocean View, who kept the totals ticking over throughout the year and this really made the difference with the two sites accounting for 53% of all birds ringed. South Landing (32%) and Thornwick Bay (9%) accounted for the bulk of the remainder. Holmes Gut (3.5%) proved to be more difficult to work because of the presence of highland cattle for much of the year, despite the low total it still remains one of our important ringing sites on the headland. Offsetting that somewhat was the development of a new ringing site in the scrub near the entrance to Thornwick Bay Holiday Village. This site seems to have good potential and it is hoped that we can register this with The British Trust for Ornithology as a CES (constant effort site). The CES scheme is a national standardised ringing programme which helps provide valuable trend information on abundance of adults and juveniles, productivity and also adult survival rates for species of common songbird.

Once more, another record-breaking year on the outer head! 4626 birds of 67 species which has more than comfortably passed last year’s record breaking Flamborough year of 3348 birds of 65 species. We have now logged this as the 7th year in succession to record a year-on-year increase in ringing totals and the third year on the bounce that we have achieved a new Flamborough record. New addition to the species list was a Kingfisher caught at Ocean View in June, the very first to be ringed in the FBO area. Other highlights were a Common Crossbill, caught in July, also at Ocean View, which is the first to be caught since the formation of the bird observatory and also the first Grasshopper Warbler for 10 years.
A breakdown of birds ringed by month is given in the table below:

The Flamborough Bird Observatory (FBO) ringing group comprises the historical recording area east of the Dykes on Flamborough Headland together with operations at Bempton, mainly at Bempton Cliffs RSPB Reserve. The purpose of the ringing group is to gather data on wild birds, especially migrants, which are found in the FBO area. The secondary purpose is to assist in the training of people in the techniques of trapping, handling and ringing wild birds.

The ringing programme was severely interrupted by the Covid lock-down, meaning that people were not allowed to travel from their homes to ring birds and as a result there was no ringing on our public headland sites for a period of over 3 months, from march through to July. Fortunately, we have resident ringers Paul & Jenny Butterworth, in the village and Andy Hood out at Ocean View, who kept the totals ticking over throughout the year and this really made the difference with the two sites accounting for 53% of all birds ringed. South Landing (32%) and Thornwick Bay (9%) accounted for the bulk of the remainder. Holmes Gut (3.5%) proved to be more difficult to work because of the presence of highland cattle for much of the year, despite the low total it still remains one of our important ringing sites on the headland. Offsetting that somewhat was the development of a new ringing site in the scrub near the entrance to Thornwick Bay Holiday Village. This site seems to have good potential and it is hoped that we can register this with The British Trust for Ornithology as a CES (constant effort site). The CES scheme is a national standardised ringing programme which helps provide valuable trend information on abundance of adults and juveniles, productivity and also adult survival rates for species of common songbird.

Once more, another record-breaking year on the outer head! 4626 birds of 67 species which has more than comfortably passed last year’s record breaking Flamborough year of 3348 birds of 65 species. We have now logged this as the 7th year in succession to record a year-on-year increase in ringing totals and the third year on the bounce that we have achieved a new Flamborough record. New addition to the species list was a Kingfisher caught at Ocean View in June, the very first to be ringed in the FBO area. Other highlights were a Common Crossbill, caught in July, also at Ocean View, which is the first to be caught since the formation of the bird observatory and also the first Grasshopper Warbler for 10 years.
A breakdown of birds ringed by month is given in the table below:

The Flamborough Bird Observatory (FBO) ringing group comprises the historical recording area east of the Dykes on Flamborough Headland together with operations at Bempton, mainly at Bempton Cliffs RSPB Reserve. The purpose of the ringing group is to gather data on wild birds, especially migrants, which are found in the FBO area. The secondary purpose is to assist in the training of people in the techniques of trapping, handling and ringing wild birds.

The ringing programme was severely interrupted by the Covid lock-down, meaning that people were not allowed to travel from their homes to ring birds and as a result there was no ringing on our public headland sites for a period of over 3 months, from march through to July. Fortunately, we have resident ringers Paul & Jenny Butterworth, in the village and Andy Hood out at Ocean View, who kept the totals ticking over throughout the year and this really made the difference with the two sites accounting for 53% of all birds ringed. South Landing (32%) and Thornwick Bay (9%) accounted for the bulk of the remainder. Holmes Gut (3.5%) proved to be more difficult to work because of the presence of highland cattle for much of the year, despite the low total it still remains one of our important ringing sites on the headland. Offsetting that somewhat was the development of a new ringing site in the scrub near the entrance to Thornwick Bay Holiday Village. This site seems to have good potential and it is hoped that we can register this with The British Trust for Ornithology as a CES (constant effort site). The CES scheme is a national standardised ringing programme which helps provide valuable trend information on abundance of adults and juveniles, productivity and also adult survival rates for species of common songbird.

Once more, another record-breaking year on the outer head! 4626 birds of 67 species which has more than comfortably passed last year’s record breaking Flamborough year of 3348 birds of 65 species. We have now logged this as the 7th year in succession to record a year-on-year increase in ringing totals and the third year on the bounce that we have achieved a new Flamborough record. New addition to the species list was a Kingfisher caught at Ocean View in June, the very first to be ringed in the FBO area. Other highlights were a Common Crossbill, caught in July, also at Ocean View, which is the first to be caught since the formation of the bird observatory and also the first Grasshopper Warbler for 10 years.
A breakdown of birds ringed by month is given in the table below:

As is the norm, the bulk of our totals are achieved throughout the autumn months, with Aug/Sep/Oct comfortably exceeding 50% of all birds caught. Our annual celebration of migration – Migweek – from the 10th to the 18th October was a resounding success, despite the lack of public involvement due to Covid restrictions. Nets were successfully erected on all 9 days, which in itself is unusual with the October weather and an impressive 1200+ birds were ringed by the group, 963 on the outer head and 251 at Bempton Cliffs RSPB. A sterling effort by all involved!
We experienced our best autumn season for catching Meadow Pipits aided by the use of mp3. lures, mainly at South Landing and Ocean View. Virtually all birds ringed were between the 31st. August and 22nd. September when nets were deployed on 16 occasions. The total ringed on the outer head was 220, another highest total since the inception of the bird observatory.
Our Redwing totals (259) again surpassed any previous year. October, as always, was the peak month for this species, returning our best catches on the 13th/14th, when an unprecedented 71 and 51 birds respectively were caught and ringed.

The top 5 species ringed east of the dykes during 2020 were all migrants or partial migrants, namely: Starling (613), Blackbird (577), Goldcrest (278), Redwing (259) and Tree Sparrow (235). Meadow Pipit came a close sixth! As was the case last year, the ringing of migrant warblers has also continued to see increase. 588 migrant warblers ringed surpassed last year’s highest ever total at Flamborough by a margin of almost 150 birds. We achieved the highest totals ever for six species of warbler; Reed Warbler (17), Lesser Whitethroat (27), Whitethroat (67), Blackcap (181), Yellow-browed Warbler (20) and Willow Warbler (123). The Willow Warbler total is particularly gratifying as it is a species that seems to turn up in ever-decreasing numbers – may 2021 continue this upward trend!

We had some 16 registered ringers and trainees active at various times during the year in addition to a few visiting ringers. My thanks to the following for keeping the Observatory ringing group going: Dave Aitken, Paul & Jenny Butterworth, Tony Corscadden, Ana Cowie, Andy Hood, Jo Hood, Andy Jayes, Jamie Johnson, Jarred Johnson, Imogen Lloyd, Lucas Mander, Ian Marshall, Elliot Morley and Josh Saunders. In the twelve-month period, in addition to the garden ringing, we completed 75 different ringing sessions at our main headland ringing sites; South Landing, Holmes Gut, Thornwick Bay and Old Fall, which was a considerable achievement considering the ringing year comprised less than 9 months.

The three best days’ ringing totals on the outer head were 145 (28/9), 166 (13/10) and 216 (14/10), the latter two achieved during the MigWeek (October 10th – 18th).
Ringing highlights of 2020, apart from species already mentioned above would include Wryneck (the 6th one to be ringed on Flamborough Head, but the first one for over 30 years!), Tree Pipit and Wood Warbler (the 16th for Flamborough) for the second year running after a gap of almost 20 years. The aforementioned three species all caught at South Landing. The number of Goldfinch (215) continues its recent increase, again the highest year total since the Observatory was founded, and Lesser Redpoll (118) was another vast improvement on last year and indeed another record-breaking total for the FBO.
Our objective, as always, in 2021 is to maintain our recent year on year increase in number of birds ringed in addition to commencing our CES study at Thornwick Bay.

Bird ringing to the west of the Dykes was carried out at Bempton and Buckton.
In 2020, ringing activities at Bempton Cliffs were mainly concentrated around the autumn months of August through to early November, with the exception of the Nest Record Scheme monitoring project. Despite missing the entire spring migration period due to the first national lockdown, a record number of birds were captured at this site, surpassing last year’s total. A total of 1132 new birds of 39 species were ringed from 26 ringing sessions, with an additional 303 pulli of 5 species.

The top five full grown species ringed were Tree Sparrow 368, Goldfinch 126, Goldcrest 88, Linnet 74 and Blackbird 59. The fourth year of a Tree Sparrow nest record scheme project was successfully completed which saw 282 nestlings ringed from 40 nest boxes.

There were several large catch days all concentrated in the month of August, with 103 new birds on 7th, 112 on 15th and 102 on 31st August. Several notable highlights occurred during the autumn period; two Whinchat on 20 August were the first to be ringed here, as was a Red-breasted Flycatcher on 17 September. On 10 October, a Blythi type Lesser Whitethroat was caught and later confirmed by DNA analysis as Siberian thanks to the good folk at Aberdeen University, it was then found wintering in a garden in York after being reported in January 2021. A Goldcrest on 14 October sporting a Norwegian was the first foreign control for this site, followed by a control Robin on 16 October which was originally ringed on Shetland two days prior. A tristis type Siberian Chiffchaff was also trapped on 16 October. A total of 8 Yellow-browed Warblers were caught between 17 September and 1 October marking another good autumn for this species on this stretch of the East Coast.

All ringing sessions at Bempton Cliffs were led by David Aitken with support from Will Scott, Poppy Rummery, Harriet Day, Ana Cowie, Geoff Carr, Julia Wildi, Andy Jayes, Imogen Lloyd and Jamie Johnson.
There was no ringing at Buckton until the Covid lockdown was lifted in late summer so no pulli ringing was undertaken. A total of 884 new birds were caught and ringed on 21 days between 13th June – 4th November. The majority of the ringing took place during good migrant arrival periods and accounted for excellent totals of 118 Robin, 113 Redwing, 101 Goldcrest, 7 Yellow-browed Warblers, 2 Dusky Warblers and single Icterine Warbler, Grasshopper Warbler and Black Redstart.

The Dusky Warblers were the standout highlight, being the first ever ringed at Buckton, the first one was only present for a day but the second was present from 15th to 28th October and had increased its weight by 3g when retrapped on the 23rd.

Ringing at Buckton was undertaken by Mark Thomas, Ed Green and Richard Hearn.
Flamborough Bird Observatory would like to thank the landowners on whose property the ringers set their nets; The Yorkshire Wildlife Trust, Bourne Leisure at Thornwick Bay Camp, Flamborough Head Golf Club and The East Riding of Yorkshire Council and the RSPB Bempton Cliffs. We would also like to thank individuals who gave donations during the ringing and migration week, with which we were able to buy some new equipment. At Buckton thanks go to land owners Buckton Hall Farm and Angus Wielkopolski.

Flamborough Headland Ringing Totals for 2020