Siskins are about!

I went to a garden in Lady Francis Drive, Market Rasen and ringed 45 birds including 42 Siskins.  I retrapped 3 others - 2 that had been ringed 2 miles away at Osgodby Woods in February and the other had a Norwegian ring!!  That is only the third foreign ringed Siskin I have caught in 42 years here!  I weighed all the birds and the weights varied from 11.4g to 15.8g with an average of 12.9g.  Judging by the weights I would expect there will still be Siskins about for a couple more weeks at least - let's hope it's the same at Scunthorpe, John!

I was at Osgodby Woods yesterday and ringed a further 22 Siskins though there were many more about in the nearby conifers.  They are also visiting my garden feeders.  The weather has definitely not been conducive to use mist nets but I just need two more today to ring 100 Siskins this month but I haven't caught any ringed elsewhere.

Thanks for that, John.  Since 1999 the Mid Lincs Ringing Group has caught over 2,200 Siskins mostly in Market Rasen but also in the Louth/Nettleton area.  They have been ringed or re-trapped in a variety of places including 9 in Scotland, 2 in Northumberland, Norfolk, Berkshire and one ringed near Osgodby was re-trapped in Norway 5 years later.  Until recently they did not appear at all some years but there is now a breeding population in the Willingham Forest woodlands.  The proximity of a large area of coniferous woodland is a major factor and Alan Ball and Bob Sheppard have caught vast numbers in the Bourne area.

Hi David,

thanks to your posting and Stuart's, today was lucky enough to have two female and one male of my own, they arrived about 2pm and was here off and on till just after 4pm. Am sure that's the first have seen in garden for best part of ten years not five. Am well chuffed!!

Will keep eye out for Brambling, in 2019 I had them visit every day for ten weeks.

We live about 1.5 miles from the woods but do have a few trees at the bottom of the garden.  The birds seem to enjoy the sunflower hearts.
The bulk of the Siskin have moved on but there are still about 10 turning up.  A rather splendid male brambling was with them this morning.

WOW that's amazing, am lucky if I get one every five years!! In the past they usually feed on either niger or sunflower seeds. 

Could it be they prefer woodland areas or close to them?