Wednesday 26 October 2011

Whooper Swan, Golden Plover and Whimbrel!

During out last 2 weeks in Iceland, our time was spent with Sverrir Thorstensen catching more Whooper Swan adults and cygnets around Akyreryi in the north of Iceland.

Our ringing totals for the 2 weeks ended with another 138 Whooper Swans being caught which included 48 retraps and 90 new birds. Some were controls included a few birds wearing BTO rings from the UK.

Kane and I usually waited in the truck whilst Sverrir caught the swans on the lake, keeping a close eye on his wear abouts and number of swans on the lake.

I also had my 1st go with the boat this year and managed to catch 5 Adult Whooper Swans, all in moult.

We were lucky as the weather during the swan catching was glorious as you can see from the photos above. Clear skies and stunning scenery added to a superb end to the trip.

Like last year we managed to catch Golden Plover and Whimbrel chicks, so this summer we caught 30 Golden Plover and 10 Whimbrel chicks.

A brood of 4 Ptarmigan chicks were caught but as you can see from the photo above they were to small to ring, very cute though!

That just about sums up our trip to Iceland this summer so I hope you have all enjoyed the read and huge thanks go to Sverrir, Thorey, Aevar and Solla for putting up with us 'Bluddy tourists' for 4 weeks. Thanks guys and see you again next year.

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