Purple Sandpiper!

Today we had a bit more of a lie in, it’s quite windy at the moment so we opened nets here in the lighthouse garden at about 08:00  for the guided tour with the junior rangers, we only caught two birds; a Dunnock (Jernspurv) and Redstart (Rødstjert) but still quite pleasing when you consider the weather. It was also good that we could show the junior rangers extraction and processing of birds and help spark an interest in them and encourage our future generation!

Then the afternoon was quite quiet, we sorted through old pictures and cleared the observatory phone. Then in the evening because it was stormy weather we decided to go out onto the beach to see if there were any seals and to see if we could catch any waders. The trip was very successful, we went out at about 11pm with a net and torch we saw 5 Foxes, 4 Natterjack Toads, 2 Seals and caught and rung a Purple Sandpiper (Sortgrå ryle), another new bird for me! Catching waders requires a lot of stealth, luck and rainy weather and tonight we had all three! It was an excellent end to the day and worth missing a couple of hours of sleep!

People: Simon S. Christiansen, Lisa Vergin and Molly Brown