Saturday, 2 May 2026

02/05 Thatcham Marsh LNR CES visit 2026/01

Location: Thatcham Marsh LNR CES Visit 2026.01
Session:   02/05/2026 06:00 to 11:00hrs
Present:   JHW, JL, IW, RAD, NC.
Weather: misty early, bright and sunny for most of the session, warm, calm.
Nets: one 198M long line of reed bed nets plus a 12m scrub net up from 06:30 to 10:30hrs.
Lures (none):

Notes:  Since last Sunday’s session somebody has stolen one of the insitu guy ropes and peg. Can’t think what use a length of some dirty weathered cord and a grubby wooden peg would be to them; I suppose they took them because they could - fortunately we had some spares with us. A good start to the Constant Effort Site season included a Garden Warbler as above. Many of the migrant species have yet to come into breeding condition, some are probably on their way through to sites elsewhere. Notable for the time of year are a few more Dunnocks than we usually get on the reed bed also the  Great Tits that included a July 2022 ringed individual.

Recaptures: (19)
Cetti’s Warbler ringed: 21/06/2025, 12/07/2025, 28/09/2025, 12/10/2025, 26/04/2024.
Chiffchaff ringed: 26/06/2025.
Great Tit ringed: 03/07/2022, 30/06/2024, 29/06/2025.
Reed Warbler ringed: 03/06/2023, 18/05/2025, .26/04/2026x2
Sedge Warbler ringed: 26/04/2026x3. 

Sightings: It was a little quite bird-wise apart from some noisy Jays foraging in the scrub. A few Swift detected high up drifting about and no hirundines seen for the second week running. Two Common Terns flew over towards Lower Farm calling, and a group of three Little Egrets flew northeast from the direction of Lower Farm. The Bank Vole ran across the track near our ringing station and the Muntjac ran down the edge of the scrub quite close to us; use to humans being about it seemed. A female Mallard with about five quite mature ducklings in tow ran across the track; fewer surviving ducklings than last week.

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