It’s that time of year again, the start of the CES (Constant Effort Site) season at the WWT National Wetland Centre in Llanelli. There are 9 WWT centres in the UK. The CES is just one of many programmes initiated by the BTO. The object of CES is to provide information about the numbers of adults, juveniles, productivity and adult survival. This information is taken from the birds we catch during the 12 ringing sessions between now and August. Click here for full details http://www.bto.org/volunteer-surveys/ringing/surveys/ces

It would be fair to say that a couple of sessions last year were poor in terms of birds being caught. The weather was awful which became a national issue for many CES sites and breeding birds were affected. More local on our site was the issue of some of the net rides being surrounded by trees that were very high and dense and birds tended to fly over the top rather than lower where they could be caught in our nets.

During the winter months the staff at WWT Llanelli have worked hard and have coppiced some of the trees to ground level and taken the tops out of others. We now wait and hope to see the benefits of this during the coming months.

CES 1 last year 2013 we caught 18 birds
Sparrow              1 male
Dunnock             2 + 1 retrap
Wren                   1 + 1 retrap
Blackcap             2 + 1 retrap
Song Thrush       2
Blue Tit               1
Chaffinch            1 + 1 retrap
Robin                  1
Chiffchaff            1
Great Tit              1 + 1 retrap

CES 1 2014 coincidently we also caught and processed 18 birds
Chiffchaff            2
Blackcap             2
Song Thrush       1
Wren                   4 + 1 retrap
Dunnock             2 + 2 retrap
Robin                  1 retrap
Long Tailed Tit   1 + 1 retrap
Blue Tit               1 retrap

We also caught a male Bullfinch. It was showing the possible start of Viral Papillomas on its legs so we let it go without being ringed.
So with the Bullfinch we caught 19 birds. I think this is a good start to the season. Any further drop in numbers being caught would have been a concern.

Thanks to Heather Coats and Phil Meade for coming along today.