Aaaaah, this is ridiculous. Google has changed it's blogging interface, which is totally different, and responds in a different way to what I'm used to. In the past, I copied a template that I created, which held the coding for tables, headings and picture frames, pasting these into a new page for each blog post which I publish. With the new interface, the 'HTML' coding does not react the same, and is causing me to have a number of problems.
The major stumbling block concerns my pictures frames, and downloading photos onto the page. If I try to download a photo into a picture frame, it ends up outside of the frame which remains empty. If I then try to download a photo, without a picture frame, the photo then ends up on the wrong part of the page, all this, giving me a major 'headache'. Photos, along with the relevent ringing and re-sighting data, are the 'life and soul' of my blog, but until I 'iron out' these problems, photos cannot be added. Even the font used, has had to be changed. Normally, I used 'Large', but with the new interface, the letters now appear larger, so I have now resorted to using 'Normal'.
I'm alway's struggling for time, for one reason or another, and could have done without this major hiccup. For now, my post will be photo-less, but once I can solve my problems, I will then add photos to each post at a later date. Pity, that I this problem was not realised sooner, especially during the months of the 'Coronavirus Lockdown', as I could have attempted to sort these problems out sooner. Once I solve the 'HTML coding', I need to create a new 'template', which helps me to create posts. I've also wondered, whether it's my browser that's causing the problem. I prefer to use 'Firefox', instead of 'Microsoft Edge'. I'm going to have to squat up on 'tutorials', to try and solve my problems. Once sorted, I will create a new template for my blog posts, which does save a lot of time. Solutions would be welcomed as well, so drop me an email.
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| Antrim Marina - Sunday 2nd August 2020 |
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As Black-headed Gulls, were listed as an 'Amber Species' (at risk), in Northern Ireland, Adam begun colour-ringing these birds in order to monitor the species to determine what was happening within our popoulation here, and to try and gain some answers, as to why they had crashed from around 38,000 breeding pairs, to an estimated 10,000 breeding pairs. Information regarding mortality rates, movements and site fidelity, formed the basis of the study, which Adam, sadly had to give up in June 2018.
The project began in 2012, with the ringing of his first Black-headed Gull - 2AAA , at Antrim Marina, on the 12th November. The gulls at Antrim Marina, formed the nucleus for the study, before gulls were colour-ringed at other sites. My involvement began on the 21st September 2013, having spotted a colour-ringed Black-headed Gull - (White) T35J, whilst on my first visit to Antrim Marina. I began checking through the other gulls, finding birds belonging to Adam. Once I learnt of Adam's Study, I began my weekly visits to the Marina, which I have continued, as a continuation of my own study.
I've been a birdwatcher since 1967, but until I came across these colour-ringed gulls, I had more or less, become inactive for a number of years, but the thought of 'Ring Reading', appealled to me, and I took up the challenge. After the winter of 2013/2014, I branched out, looking for ringed birds elsewhere, and also re-trained to become a ringer myself. I now hold, all of the ringing details for Adam's former project, and respond to sightings reported to me.
When possible I colour-ring Black-headed Gulls, especially at Antrim Marina, to replace the number of gulls which have died over the years. I do not intend to follow the 'context' of Adam's former project, but I am recording the life spans and movements of the gulls especially at the Marina, for my own interest.
Today, I arrived at the Marina at 9.45am, departing at 13.15pm. Around 30 Black-headed Gulls were present, and numbers slowly built up to around 100 birds altogether. Fourteen colour-ringed Black-headed Gulls were recorded, from a total of between 30 to 40 birds, which should be recorded over the coming weeks. No doubt, some will not have survived the stresses of this summer's breeding season, or the migrations to and from their breeding sites. The casualties will be identified over the coming weeks, by their non-reappearance, as Black-headed Gulls tend to be 'site faithful', in their choice of breeding and wintering sites.
| 2CSR | 2CJT | 2ABK | 2ABS | 2ACV | 2FDK | 2BRA |
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| 2AAV | 2AAK | 2CSA | 2CSJ | 2CTC | 2CSB | 2ABN |
The gulls colour-ringed with the 2A** series of rings, were ringed early into Adam's study, and since then, the residential status for these birds are now firmly established. Just four gulls were ringed with the 2B** series, with 2BRA being the only resident bird. 2BRD , is an occasional visitor, as was 2BRC , which has not been recorded for a while now. 2BRB , disappeared from the 'radar' shortly after being ringed. The 2C** and 2F** series of colour-rings, are more recently rung gulls, where I have caught and rung these birds in order to replace 'lost' gulls, and to maintain overall numbers within my Antrim Marina Study. However, I'm still trying to establish the residential status for most of these. Winter re-sightings are fairly routine and easy, whilst summer observations, both last year and this past summer, have been interupted by the building of the new 'Gateway Centre' (housing the new cafe / resturant) in 2019, and the more recent 'Coronavirus Lockdown'.
Of today's fourteen birds, 2AAK , 2ACV and 2ABN , are considered to be non-residents.
2AAK , was caught and ringed by Adam, here at the Marina, on the 21st December 2012, as an adult male. The final sighting of 2AAK , during the winter of 2012/2013, was made on the 1st March 2013. The return and departure dates for 2AAK , are listed below, and there has been no breeding season observations reported during the months of April, May and June. Although I do not begin my weekly visits to the Marina, until the first weekend of August each year, it appears that 2AAK does actually return from mid July onwards :-
Return - 5th September 2013 (probably arrived sooner, through lack of regular observations), Departure - 9th March 2014.
Return - 16th August 2014, Departure - after 4th March 2015.
Return - 16th July 2015, Departure - after 28th February 2016.
Return - 2nd August 2016, Departure - after 5th March 2017.
Return - 21st August 2017, Departure - after 12th March 2018.
Return - 1st August 2018, Departure - after 25th February 2019.
Return - 4th August 2019, Departure - after 2nd March 2020.
Return - 25th July 2020.
Having fully updated Adam's Black-headed Gull Database, I now continue to add all of the latest sightings, and there are a total of 220 records of 2AAK , all having been made at Antrim Marina. With such a lengthy history of re-sightings, to know exactly where this bird breeds, would be a bonus. Hopefully, a breeding season sighting will occur before this gull expires.
2ACV , was caught and ringed at Antrim Marina, by Adam, as a first winter bird, on the 21st October 2013, and disappeared from the site after the 10th November 2013. At the time, being a youngster of the year, I had presumed that 2ACV may have died, as on average, some two-thirds of chicks fail to survive through to the end of their first winter. It came as a bit of a surprise, when 2ACV turned up again in the following autumn :-
Return - 31st August 2014, Depature - after 2nd April 2015.
23rd July 2015 - Spotted at Sprucefield Shopping Centre, Lisburn, Co. Antrim by Suzanne Belshaw (no doubt on it's way back to Antrim Marina).
Return - 28th July 2015, Departure - after 20th March 2016.
24th April 2016 - Spotted by Richard du Feu, at the RSPB's Leighton Moss Nature Reserve, in Lancashire, England.
Return - 28th July 2016, Departure - after 26th February 2017.
Return - 3rd September 2017, Departure - after 12th March 2018.
Return - 5th August 2018, Departure - after 25th March 2019.
Return - 19th August 2019, Departure - after 16th March 2020.
Return - 2nd August 2020.
2ABN , is considered to be a non-resident, although I have one record of the gull being present at Antrim Marina during the breeding season. This occurred on the 8th June 2017, but this may have been the result of a failed breeding attempt, which prompted the early return. 2ABN , was ringed at the Marina, as adult female, on the 23rd January 2013, and was last recorded on the 15th March 2013. Thereafter, the return and departure dates, are as follows :-
Return - 18th September 2013, Departure - after 21st February 2014.
Return - 26th September 2014, Departure - after 22nd March 2015.
Return - 9th August 2015, Departure - after 29th February 2016.
Return - 15th July 2016, Departure - after 12th February 2017.
Return - 8th June 2017, Departure - after 5th March 2018.
Return - 30th July 2018, Deparure - after 11th March 2019.
Return - 19th August 2019, Departure - after 2nd March 2020.
Return - 2nd August 2020.
Of the other gulls recorded with 2A** series of rings recorded by me at Antrim Marina today, they are all known to be year round residents, each with numerous breeding season sightings. One bird, that I had hoped to record during today's visit, was 2AAA , the very first gull to be colour-ringed at Antrim Marina, at the beginning of Adam's project.
Although I did not record 2AAA , on Sunday evening, I received an email from Kate McAllister, who happened to be at Antrim Marina, at 8.30am on Sunday morning. Reporting five colour-ring sightings, among those was 2AAA , along with photos for all five sightings. 2AAA , was ringed as an adult male at the Marina, on the 12th November 2012. Another resident to the Marina, Kate's sighting, was the 231st record for this bird. As the oldest bird from Adam's former project, the duration of 2AAA , it is now 7 years, 8 months and 21 days since being ringed. The other four gulls recorded by Kate, were also re-sighted later on during my visit.
| 2ABK | 2AAA | 2CSR | 2ACV | 2FDK |
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Between Kate and myself, the total of fifteen sightings, form the beginning of this winters list of colour-ringed Black-headed Gulls which have been ringed here. By the time of my departure around 1.15pm, only three juvenile Black-headed Gulls were recorded at any one time. This low number of juveniles, points to the fact, that the gulls may have had another poor breeding season, out on the nearby former 'Torpedo Platform'. The number of juveniles, will un-doubtedly increase, as birds passing through will realise that an easy meal can be found here. Over the course of this winter, I will again capture and colour-ring a few more individuals to add to my own study.
Other Birds at Antrim Marina
The first thing that caught my eye when I arrived, was the number of Mallards present. During the final weeks, of my weekly visits to the Marina back in March, numbers were very much on the low side, and very few ducks were present, when I made a visit here on the 29th June 2020. Today saw at least 60 to 70 Mallards present, with numbers easily topping the 100 mark by the time of my departure. Most were checked for rings, but it is a long time now since I last recorded one here. Perhaps the gun clubs in County Monaghan, do not ring their captive reared ducklings before release anymore.
A pair of Mute Swans, along with six cygnets had me puzzled. Back on the 29th June, a pair with five cygnets were observed, but passing folk commented, that there had been six chicks the previous week, which indicated that one was lost or had died. Later on during my visit, I was approached by a male birdwatcher, who asked for another card for my blog-site. Talking to him about the birds present, I learnt that two pairs of Mute Swans had hatched chicks near to the Marina. One pair, had hatched five, a short distance upriver, while the second pair, had hatched six, just around the corner of Lough Neagh, not far from the breakwater leading to the Marina.
This now gave me the explanation about the brood sizes. I've asked my ringing trainer, John Clark, to purchase 20 metals for the use on swans. I had wanted to begin colour-ringing swans at Antrim Marina, but have been dissuaded from doing so, by my ringing counterpart in Dublin. Graham Prole stated, 'be careful for what you wish for', sending me a copy of the re-sighting history for one of his colour-ringed swans. This history was endless, with so many re-sightings, that it would have been a real pain to reply to these, as well as submitting the sightings to the BTO. I therefore decided, that the use of metals at Antrim Marina would suffice, and only ring readers with a good camera can capture the number on the metals. I also plan to ring cygnets only, as they are of known age.
Two Herring Gulls appeared, the first being this summers youngster. Likely to have hatched out in late May or early June, this juvenile had already 'cotted on' to the easy feeds, and had a field day feeding on bread being thrown out to the ducks. The second bird, a full adult, may well be the same bird that was here throughout the tail end of last winter/spring. Just the one Common Gull arrived, being a second summer bird (hatched 2019). Almost all of the brown feathering on the wings has moulted out, and this bird disappeared again, around 10 minutes later.
A total of seven Jackdaws were a maximum count, with two of these being very skinny looking juveniles. Two Hooded Crows arrived just before I departed, these being juveniles as well.
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