Wash Wader Ringing Group

Friday 29th August

PLI did recce on the morning tide:-
Snettisham:- 500+ Sanderling. Moved position several times. Also the odd Dunlin and a few Turnstone.
Heacham:- No Oystercatchers. Flock of up to 100 mixed grey waders but these left about high tide.

Team arrived during the afternoon and evening. Small contingent to Lincolnshire with the rest staying to set four small mesh nets on Snettisham North beach ready for the morning.

Saturday 30th August

Up 04:10. On Snettisham North at first light, 500 Sanderling just beyond the nets. Lifted of their own accord but remained beyond the nets. RW twinkled and got part of the flock in front of the nets but split between nets 2 and 3. The rest of the flock was about three net lengths further along the beach. With the tide now reaching the point where it would be too close decided to fire rather than twinkle again. Chose net three to fire but number caught rather disappointing

Manned the remaining nets.Small numbers of birds present and further twinkling by RW. Just as it was getting to the point where the tide had fallen off too far 20 birds landed in front of net 2 so fired and caught about half.

For the second month running our catching activities had been recorded on film, this time for a film about activities on the Wash. At the cameraman’s request one of the unfired nets was fired over his running camera.

Back at base recce results were reported:-
Terrington (E) to left of white barn; Lots of Curlew near cannon netting site.
Terrington (E) to right of white barn; Difficult to see due to mist but Dunlin, Greenshank and Redshank on the borrow pit, not in a catchable site. On the normal cannon netting pool 200 Dunlin and 20 Grey Plover well spread out. A Buzzard (a first for this marsh) put up 1500 Barwit and several hundred Curlew.

On the basis of this information some of the team departed immediately to strim the usual site for Curlew and were later followed by the rest of the team to set four small mesh nets. Following food at 16:00 these nets were manned and fairly soon after the team was in position the first Curlew landed. Numbers grew to 21 and then left. This pattern was then repeated with numbers reaching about 35 on a couple of occasions. Twinkling brought birds back to the area and when about 40 in decided to wait no longer. Only caught:

due to one cannon, in the most critical place, failing to fire.  Subsequent investigation established it was either a defective fuse or a firing box fault.  Bed 22:00.

Sunday 31st August

Up 04:00. Foggy! Got in to position (same nets as last night, reset) but nets invisible from the hide. Some sounds of birds moving but otherwise quiet. Gave up and retrieved equipment when firing team decided the catching area was about to flood.

Recces were also affected by the fog but reported:-
Terrington (E) to right of white barn (NAC):- Despite lack of trees a squirrel was on the sea wall! Dunlin heard.
Ken Hill:- Just 8 Curlew and few suitable fields (JS).
Terrington W):- No birds on fields (RW). Some Ringed Plover at Nene mouth.

With little information to make decisions on, decided to use the saltmarsh pool to the right of the white barn. A few people went to work out where to set, finding lots of droppings and marking positions for five small mesh nets. Set and manned the nets after tea, the thunderstorm which had looked likely to affect us having gone elsewhere. NAC/MS watched from the sea wall with others under covering material near the nets. Various cattle problems had to be dealt with. Birds initially went in to both sets of two nets and several times got to about 40 catchable before they left again. Further cattle problems caused several people from base to leave their hiding place and herd cattle. Whilst this was going on birds started landing on the pool again, now being in the seaward pair of nets plus a third single net. As all would be caught dry, fired all three.

The original idea had been to deal with the catch in the white barn but when the generator failed to work the catch was taken back to the main base and processed there.  Bed 23:00

Monday 1st September

Up 04:30. Returned to man same nets as last evening. One net failed to test so switched cables round. Most cattle had left the marsh but some remained and had to be dealt with by base when they got close to the cables. Fewer birds than last night showed interest in the pool and those that did were on the inland side of the pool. Got to a potential catch of 40 but with Ringed Plover in the safety area. Vigorous jiggling failed to move these birds. RR was then sent to get closer and had the desired effect of clearing safety but also cleared everything else. A little later some birds landed and the net was fired but with long jump ropes and birds on the edge of the pool, rather than in it as expected, the net went over about half the potential catch.

Water did not flood in to the pool until after high tide which was a surprise given the predicted tide height.

Recces results were disappointing:-
Holbeach (C) 1000+ Golden Plover came over early but no other waders found.
Terrington:- Counts of 500 Curlew, 1500 Grey Plover, 1000 Redshank but not in catchable places. The mist netting pool had a maximum of 80 Dunlin.
Snettisham / Heacham:- 6 Oystercatchers on the beaches. Nothing on Ken Hill.

Decided the best course of action was not to try to catch on the evening tide and then try the mist netting pool in the morning. This was visited during the afternoon to strim and mark net sets.

Tuesday 2nd September

Up 04:30. Arrived at gate in to Terrington (E) to find gate key missing. It also started to rain. Decided couldn’t do anything other than recce.

Ken Hill (RL):- No birds found
Heacham beach (RL):- 500 Oystercatchers and 200 Sanderling, joined by 100 Dunlin
Ongar Hill / Terrington (E) (JS); Three flocks of 1000 Knot flew across Wash towards Snettisham. Flocks in usual places on saltmarsh. Many Curlew went inland by high tide but other species stayed put. 300 Dunlin on the pool we should have been set on! Nothing on the pool where previous catches had been made.
Inner Bund to Terrington (E)(PI):- Lots of Redshank on saltmarsh inland of bund. 1000 Golden Plover on a field Terrington (C). Lots of Curlew on the saltmarsh. Eventually most of these went inland to a Terrington (E) field. Also 200 Curlew on the field by the white barn but these left by high tide. Additional sightings were another lost squirrel on the road to the bund car park and a Short eared Owl. Lots of Little Egrets present.
Inner Bund to Terrington(W) (LM/SB):- 400 Grey Plover on field 1 hour before high tide and joined by 1000 Knot half an hour before tide.
Gedney (NAC/JAC/AD) Found 2000 mixed grey waders on the marsh near wildfowlers ‘point 5’ but marsh under water at high tide. ca. 100 Ringed Plover on a field south of Gedney and 50 Black tailed Godwit on growing cabbages.
Boatmere (NAC/JAC/AD) 280 Black tailed Godwit almost all Juveniles and 50 Greenshank.
Holbeach (RduF/GDC/TW) Field at Holbeach C) had 350 Curlew, 200 Black-tailed Godwit, 50 Knot plus ca. 1250 Golden Plover.

The issue of the missing key was resolved when NAC and RduF found it was needed by the farm late at night and they had not thought we would need it that early. In the event it was a blessing in disguise as it would have been horrible on the marsh in the pouring rain!

Decided to split team for the morning and set in two places. Hence got the necessary permissions and set nets on the Terrington (W) and Holbeach (C) fields. The Holbeach team on the way back to base had to deal with a flat tyre on the trailer.

With threatening cloud decided to have food prepared by LM (recipe below) before going to set mist nets. The plan was to try netting on the bund road and with the immediate threat of rain gone went to set. Got as far as setting three nets when saw a storm approaching with very impressive lightning. Decided discretion was the better part of valour and took the nets down and returned to base. This proved the right thing to do as the storm passed right overhead.

Wednesday 3rd September

The people sleeping in the annex had an eventful night! Firstly the bed M & JS were sleeping in chose to collapse and just when they had transferred to another bed MS’s alarm went off at twenty past midnight.

Up 05:45. At Holbeach set decoys and in hide just under 2 hours before tide. Fairly soon Golden Plover arrived but formed flock (ca. 800) at other end of field. After a disturbance, the next Golden Plover to arrive landed with the decoys (4) or just out of the catching area (ca.10). However the rest of a big flock landed behind the nets. These gradually spread and about 100 would have been catchable if the nets had been firing the other way. Various other flocks landed but not near the nets. No grey waders landed on the field all morning. Gave up shortly after high tide.

The team at Terrington (W) were in position on time. About 07:30 a small flock of Dunlin joined the decoys. Some settled there and despite Harriers, Kestrels and a Peregrine, stayed there. Golden Plover also came on to the field but not near the nets. By high tide nothing else had come to the field and with only 2 dunlin visible in the catching area, gave up. On approaching the nets to pick them up 30 Dunlin flew away!

A further recce had been done at Terrington (E) by NAC. This identified a possible site for Curlew and also other waders further to the west of the site used earlier in the week. Walked out to inspect this area and later a team went out to strim the catching site.

Although no rain was predicted the wind, already strong, was predicted to increase so no mist netting was possible.

Thursday 4th September

Up 05:30. Four small mesh nets set as a clap net pair. Although a small number of birds did look at the decoys and come in to the catching area never a worthwhile catch. As tide rose birds tended to land just seaward of the catching area. Kept getting 10 to 20 in the catching area and briefly had 150 but no chance to fire. Near high tide the numbers in the area declined and so gave up shortly after high tide. With no chance of drying equipment before people left, nets were spread in the shed and people departed early afternoon.