10/08 Greenham Common

 Location: Greenham Common Western Enclosure

Session: 10-Aug-2020, 07:30 to 10:45hrs

Notes: A walk over the common yesterday when there seemed to be a bit of a movement of throats, white and lesser, also a Redstart and a couple of Wheatears seen as well as the usual stuff so I had good expectations for today. We did capture three Whitethroats otherwise numbers were disappointing. Of interest was a very grey looking Willow Warbler; the wing formula was emarginated to the 5th primary, the wing point was 3rd and 4th primary and slightly different to the normal the point of the second primary was just between the 6th and 7th primary; normally it is between the 5th and 6th but can be shorter when still growing. We occasionally capture these, they are race from probably further north. It would be nice to from know where.

One of today's Whitethroats, probably a male (grey wash-ish to head and shoulders).

Photos of Willow Warblers: the top one shows the normal colouring while the lower one is of the "grey" bird ringed today

Present: JL,IW

Weather: Cloudy early clearing and getting warmer as the session progressed, mostly calm occasionally a breezy, few spots of rain mid-session.

Nets: 48metres in 3 net rides, two 18M and one 12M net up from 08:00 to 10:30hrs

Lure (Audio): Warblers, Misc Migrants, Redstart, intermittently.

Recaptures:(none)

Sightings 35 Species A herring Gull is a scarce bird these days so an immature over N was nice to see. Two flocks of swallows plus a couple of  single figure groups moving S; some lingered over the bunker pool.