Hi everyone.
You may have seen Joan's blog post about the great grey shrike on Saturday 27 February.
Well I have some pictures that I thought you might like to see, but I will start from the beginning of the story....
So on Saturday 18 February we spotted a grey grey shrike on the reserve on the main track between the Ashby and Lagoon hide. It was a bit flighty and moved about a bit. This was very exciting for us as we don't get them very often!
On Sunday (19 February) we were delighted again with some great views. The bird started on the main path between the Ashby and Lagoon hides, then far end of the lagoon seen from the Tern hide, then across to near the Kingfisher hide, back to the main path and the latest report has been near the Kingfisher hide again! Keith Bedford managed to get a couple of pictures, like this one below: Great grey shrike at Rye Meads on Sunday 19 February, picture taken by Keith Bedford.
Now, after Sunday we didn't see the bird again. The Rye Meads Ringing Group did spot it once on the Thames Water side on Sunday afternoon. After that we didn't see it. Now this bird is quite flighty so it could have been around, just sitting behind some cover so we didn't get to see it.
This Saturday (25 February) the Rye Meads Ringing Group caught the bird. The Ringers are trained and licenced to catch and ring birds. They put small rings on the birds legs - they aren't heavy and they don't restrict movement. The rings are like us wearing a wrist watch. Ringing is a really important technique, it allows each bird to have an individual ring number so if it is seen again it can be found out where it's come from and where it goes to. Ringing can give us really important information about bird populations and movements, and has provided amazing data from around the world. If you would like some more information about the Rye Meads Ringing Group check out their website here. If you are interested in Ringing and want to see the Ringers in action they host events at Rye Meads when they invite the public along to see what they do and get close up views of the birds... keep an eye out as we will be running these events in May, August and September!
Back to the shrike... They caught the shrike and were kind enough to show us. Have a look at these pictures taken by Site Manager Joan Childs:
The Ringers are highly trained, Ringing does not hurt the bird!
Here you can see (from left to right) Toby (one of the Ringers), Andy (one of our volunteers) and Sarah (one of the Ringers) looking at the shrike.
After being released the shrike went and sat in a tree by the Lapwing hide for a while -
HUGE thanks to Toby and Sarah from the Ringing Group who showed us this amazing bird up close!
So keep an eye out you never know if we'll see it or where it could be!