05/10/2013 Leighton Moss

Bearded Tit: Over the last few days the Bearded Tits at Leighton have been showing incredibly well and in some superb numbers with 15 individuals showing on the grit trays.

After arriving at 7am on a very cold Autumn morning and standing in one place for a few chilly hours I was thrilled when the birds turned up. One female came early on in the morning but only stayed briefly before melting in to the reeds.

I had to wait two hours before I saw another but just like bus's when one turns up nine do!

Mr John Wilson was in the reedbed behind us with his mist nets up and recordings to lure the birds over.

John was kind enough to emerge out of the reeds to show me a male and female Bearded Tit in the hand this was totally awesome.

It was great to see the detail you can often miss, like the birds black  under-tail coverts.

Another thing I enjoyed making a note of was the bird's coloured rings, for example the bird in John's hand is purple over white which I saw again on the grit trays when it was released.




I spotted four males in all and five females all of whom could be tracked and traced by monitoring their rings.






John told me that he had caught two young birds a few days earlier of which he had put new rings on showing that they had once again successfully bred at Leighton Moss, cracking stuff!