Crows in Brussels

Today I got the chance to spend some time in a city parc in Brussels, resulting in the reading of 10 c-ringed Carrion crows. These birds are all ringed somewhere in Brussels (I am waiting for the details), with white or yellow rings with 2 codes. No pictures today (I didn't take my camera since I didn't know how easy it would be te read rings), that's something for the next time there...

Local twitching

Today I went to see some local scarce birds: a female Eider was a good inland bird (present since yesterday), and 6 Bewick's swans were a good bonus. The last week of 2012, I saw about 200 of these swans in the north of Belgium, where they are a common winter bird. Among them were 3 Whooper swans, of which I put a picture below too.

Female Eider, nice inland bird.

3 of the 6 Bewick's swans present in my region.

Whooper swan, Krekengebied NO-Vlaanderen, december 2012.

Boulogne

Yesterday I visited the area of Boulogne-sur-Mer to Calais, in the hope of reading some rings of Mediterranean gulls. It started slwoly, but at the end of the day I ended up with exactly 50 rings, from the following species: Mediterranean gull: 39 (mostly Belgian and French birds, also 1 from Poland and Hungary); Herring gull: 6 (3 Dutch, 2 Belgian, 1 British); Black-headed gull: 3 (1 French, Danish and Polish); Greater black-backed gull: 2 (Norwegian and French). The focus was on reading rings, but I managed to get some pictures too, as can be seen below. Hundreds of large gulls were present at Le Portel, but as always they were very wary and flew off all the time...

Mediterranean gull white E644 on the beach of Le Portel.

Herring gull yellow 5W (RJ Buijs), always seen at the port of Boulogne-sur-Mer.

Herring gull white A7JG (R Thompson), a beautiful bird.

Herring gull white F.4 (RJ Buijs), on the beach of Le Portel.

Herring gull blue YUA.C (E Stienen), always nice to see one of our Belgian birds abroad!

Greater black-backed gull black 75L (G Le Guillou), most likely a bird from Le Havre. This is only my 3rd bird from this project.

Some pictures from last year

Another short post, this one with some of the (few) rings I read the past months. I hope to be able to read more rings in the coming months, hopefully with some nice pictures. In the meantime, some older pictures:

Egyptian goose green X, ringed and seen in Brussels.

Mute swan white C55, seen in Chassepierre in autumn 2011.

Cormorant green H I 1, a Dutch bird seen in Nieuwpoort last summer.

Another Cormorant, red 5SE this time, a Danish bird, also seen last summer.

A Dutch Oystercatcher, seen last autumn in Nieuwpoort.

Norwegian Black-headed gull white J9Y1, also seen in Nieuwpoort last autumn.

And finally 1st cal Herring gull blue Y.UAD (E. Stienen), seen in August in Nieuwpoort.

Back again

After quite a while without any updates here, I will try to post some pictures and on this blog in 2013. This year I didn't read as many rings as in previous years,, but in the past weeks I picked up again with c-reading. Yesterday I visited a part of the Zeebrugge-colony (the only part which is still accessable), where many Herring gulls were already present for the next breeding season.

1st cal Herring gull Y.CAZ, Oostende

ad Herring gull S.TAW, Zeebrugge Front harbour

ad Herring gull LH.AL, Zeebrugge Front harbour

ad Herring gull FTA.V, Zeebrugge Front harbour

Nice surprise

When I drove home this afternoon, as I was approaching Gent, I noticed a Greater black-backed gull landing on a street lantern and immediately noted a large c-ring. GBBG's are not very common in Gent, and I had never seen one with a c-ring here, so I stopped the car and quickly took some pictures. Luckily the code was readable, and it turned out to be blue J9MN, a bird ringed in 2007 in Norway. A very nice surprise, and my first Norwegian bird in Gent too. Earlier today I had seen two of our wing-tagged Marsh harriers, I will try to put some more pictures of these birds later on.

GBBG blue J9MN (M. Helberg), Langerbrugge (near Gent).

Oostende and Zeebrugge

An afternoon visit to both breeding colonies of Oostende and Zeebrugge today, with a total of 43 rings! Many of these were juvenile birds, some of them not yet able to fly. Now I hope to see some of the young birds of today later on in autumn/winter! Sadly, also several dead birds, most of them because of traffic... Three of the dead juvenile birds were ringed, of which one with a colour-ring.

4th cal Herring gull blue CJ.AK (E Stienen), Oostende.

Adult Herring gull blue M.KAD (E Stienen), Oostende.

Juvenile LBBG blue TNA.P (E Stienen), Oostende.

Part of a colony in Oostende.

Juvenile Herring gull blue S.HAD (E Stienen), Zeebrugge.

Juvenile Herring gull blue SC.AP (E Stienen), Zeebrugge.

Juvenile Herring gull blue SBA.L (E Stienen), Zeebrugge.

Juvenile Herring gull blue S.AAX (E Stienen), Zeebrugge.

Juvenile LBBG metal Brussel L915714, killed by a car or truck..., Zeebrugge.

Adult Herring gull blue FMA.W (E Stienen), Zeebrugge.

Adult Herring gull blue CUA.D (E Stienen), Zeebrugge.