Today marked the first day of catching Hawfinches at Dolgellau in the excellent company of Hawfinch maestro Dave Smith and garden-feeding Hawfinch champions Trevor and Chris Bashford. There were plenty of birds present today but catching was modest with just 7 birds caught including 4 new and 3 retraps.
Dave also had news of one of our birds that had been found dead in a Churchyard in Denbighshire yesterday. It had originally been ringed Yellow C68 as a 2 year+ male at our main woodland study site on 7th April 2012 (on a visit with Lee and Rachael Barber). When next caught on 5th May 2012 (at the same site) it had already managed to crack off its colour-ring so was re-ringed Yellow E10. On 15th June 2013 it was recorded at a nest-site several kilometres from the ringing site by Dave Smith. Amazingly the next sighting was in Trevor and Chris's garden feeding recently fledged (ringed) young over 6km from that known nest on 2nd July 2013. Following 25 more positive sightings and 1 retrap it was last recorded in the Dolgellau area on 27th June 2015. On 5th February 2017 its two bloodied rings and a pile of freshly plucked feathers were found by John Harrop in Ruthin, 50 kms from where it was ringed!! There is clearly much still to be learnt about this stealth finch with nomadic tendencies.
Dave has recently written an article on Hawfinches in Meirionydd for Natur Cymru, I will attempt to get a pdf copy and post a link
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