Thursday 21 May 2009

Chick Ringing 2

Here is a video of yesterdays ringing of the four peregrine falcon chicks on Derby Cathedral. It took place at 7pm last night, and was quickly over. Our thanks to the two volunteer ringers - Ant and Martin - who have many years of ringing experience between them. Ant believes we have two males and two females, based on their size and degree of development.



Even before we had left the tower the female was back at the nest platform, though was not surprisingly a little unsettled to begin with.


by Marski2009
Derby Peregrines ringed chicks 4


Derby Peregrines ringed chicks 3

32 comments:

Roger (AT) said...

Congratulations to the team! Swiftly and professionally done. The video gave a very good impression of their size compared to the ringers hands, they are much bigger than I had imagined from the cam-view.

So from the size comments, am I right that Tiddler is Mr. T? - now wearing his first jewellery :-)

This morning the chicks are huddled up in the right hand tray with a parent perched nearby.
They are clearly favouring the clean side!

Anonymous said...

Just been watching the video of the ringing of the chicks. Well done to Ant and Martin. It made me feel dizzy just watching the abseiling down the tower! Hoping to come up over the weekend and meet some of the team on Monday.

Great work.

Mary T - Caerphilly, S. Wales

Anonymous said...

The video is amazing !! Thank you for showing us the whole ringing process, it's very educational. It would be nice if you can include this in your next DVD. Can you tell what are the ring numbers for the four chicks? Jennie, HK.

Roger (AT) said...

Falcon arrived with breafast arrived at 06:52.
The tiercel flew from the tray edge up to the pudding cam, but soon disappeared from view.
Shots on Flickr.

Jayne said...

Well done team your job must be very rewarding when these beautiful birds fledge safely!
Jayne

Anonymous said...

Pax Canada 12.29am
thank you for the wonderful video, it all went so well, a big thank you to ant and martin

Terri said...

Fantastic video, really grateful that you could bring that to us so we can see how it's done. The chicks are huge aren't they, didn't realise how big they are before. I know it's all done very carefully and quickly and discretely but you can't help feeling for the little mites, they must be so worried about what's going on, and the poor parents racing around screeching, must be distressing for them. I wonder if they have memories of it from previous years and perhaps realise that it's not so bad after all? Anyway, congratulations and thanks again.

Peregrine Project Member (Nick M.) said...

Sorry - I've not quite caught up on which bird got which ring, but the numbers are 008, 009, 010 and 011.

Birds are fairly, well, bird-brained, so I don't think they remember past events in the way we might imagine. They have natural responses to a range of stimuli. In the case of chicks at this age, they huddle together in a corner. Wait a few more days and they respond far more actively and this would put them in danger.

Good luck to Brigg Infants School who are come to Derby Museum & Art Gallery today to be guinea pigs for a brand new educational session on birds of prey.

Terry, Herts UK said...

Brilliant video. Fantastic job, well done.

Karen Anne said...

Great work and great video. The chicks are soooo much bigger than I had thought. I so envy your guys having gotten an excuse to hold them.

I am surprised they didn't wear some head and eye protection. In the video I saw 2-3 years ago of the San Jose, CA ringing, I believe a parent was swooping in and actually hitting the fellow with his or her talons? wings? You could hear whaps on the video.

Anonymous said...

That was brilliant to watch, a masterclass in chick ringing.

I agree with Roger, it's amazing how big they are when we could see them in the ringers hands.

Well done team, you are all fantastic.

Fiona Arrowsmith said...

Just viewed the video with my daughter, it's brilliant! I'm so pleased that it all went well. Elizabeth was quite worried and asked me if they were scared, so i've had to explain to her that they were in very safe hands and that Mummy is now back with the little big ones!
Well done to everyone involved, what a fabulous job! :)

Anonymous said...

Wow! 011. That means we've had 10 chicks since 2007 which is not bad. Jennie, HK.

Anonymous said...

Feeding time at Brighton. 4th. chick just hatched. Anyone getting baby-chick withdrawal symptoms can ease them there.

Roger (AT) said...

Whilst the Derby Cathedral chicks are taking another nap. you might be interested in this link to the Canadian Peregrine Foundation.

Peregrine BiologyI found the section about chick development stages, and what one might expect to see each week to be useful.

Anonymous said...

Darn! My work's IT policy blocks out videos and stuff so I shall have to wait till I get home to see it. It sounds so tantalising from everyone's comments, can't wait. I seem to vaguely recall that last year's "tiddler" was ring no 007? ("licenced to kill" but not great at flying initially) - and do I recall that one ring had to be discarded for some reason? (so there's actually been one less chick than rings used)
To everyone whose mentioned hoping to visit on Monday - I plan to go too so look forward to meeting up. As to size of chicks, 2 years ago, I was sent a brilliant photo of a Derby chick in the hand (I think it was a "thank you" for donations, just in case it encourages anyone else to think about donating to this fabulous project, without wishing to put the project in a difficult situation!!!) It was the whopping great big yellow feet of the chick that gobsmacked me.

Roger (AT) said...

The falcon was busy feeding them in the scrape side of the tray.
Chicks have eaten themselves to a standstill.
The tiercel is sitting comfortably up on the tower.

Ah! 13:45 WCT she has departed. Surprisingly the tiercel stays aloft, and does not seem intent on raiding the larder.

Phoebe said...

Just watched the video, and what a superb job you guys Ant and Martin have done!

It was less traumatic for the chicks than I imagined obviously experience at work there.

Super shots of the Falcon too, she is so protective what a brilliant Mother.

Thanks for the video.

Anonymous said...

Great video, team. And as others had mentioned, I had no idea they were that big – they’re huge!
RJ

Anonymous said...

Great work! Would there be any possibility of weighing + measuring the juveniles in the future?

Phoebe said...

Have the webcams seem to be stuck at 16:36 hours, have they jammed or are they turned off?

Kishore said...

Mine's stuck at 16:36. Nothing those IT guys can't handle I'm sure.

Terry, Herts UK said...

@anon

There cannot be any further interference with these protected birds for measuring/weighing or other reason.

When they fledge, if they fall to the ground and can be rescued, with the grace of God, the team will try to return them to the scrape as soon as possible to give them another chance.

They'll all hopefully be around for a few weeks to come, though you may not see them on the cameras. The falcons are brilliant parents. There will very likely be flying and hunting lessons still to come before the 4 eyases finally set off to lead their own lives.

Must say I was amazed to see how quickly and efficiently the eyases were ringed. Of course, I realise the video was edited but even so... obviously, a great deal of thought was put into this operation and I'm sure it's been noted by many of us that this year, there was a plan not to bring the little ones indoors.

Anonymous said...

Both cameras frozen, nothing happening.

Roger (AT) said...

anyone got a shilling for the meter?

Peregrine Project Member (Nick M.) said...

We are aware of the camera freeze. This time it appears to be a problem with our equipment inside the tower because our VPN is functioning OK (which gets us into the Council's network), but we can't "see" the video server itself.
This suggests a power failure or -worse -equipment failure. Though 16:35 is suspiciously like closing time for some of the staff at the Silk Mill Museum - so it could be that someone has been saving the planet over there by turning off power sockets, and thus the "receiver" inside the building which takes our radio signal from the cathedral. We'll do our best to rectify this.

We're are looking into it.

Anonymous said...

Thanks for looking into this. At first wondered whether it was something wrong on my computer.

If my memory serves me, I seem to remember the power being switched off at the Silk Mill Museum once before during one of the other years since the peregrines have been at our Cathedral?

Must congratulate everyone on the ringing last night, an absolutely super video for all to watch.

Peregrine Project Member (Nick M.) said...

Thanks for the feedback on the ringing video. In a conversation later that evening with three primary school teachers who came down to watch, we dicussed the possibility of making the raw .avi files from the video camera available for schools to edit and make into their own story - much as you see on the YouTube clip. We could also provide the files created duing last year's peregine rescue. There's quite a bit involved in that, but I'd be interested to know if other teachers might find this of interest as an ICT project. If I get a lot of interest I'll probably take this forward later in the year.

wayne1984 said...

@ project members, i was wondering if there is much feedback from the rings???? have you had any info at all from previous years?

Anonymous said...

Er, is it me, or has Derby turned into the Land of the Midnight sun? !t's 11:15pm and the webcam I'm seeing is in blazing sunshine?

Peregrine Project Member (Nick M.) said...

@wayne We've had no feedback at all on the past ringed birds. Statistically we're not likely to get much, though the bright orange colour ring might be reported to us if it were seen, even though the numbers themselves might not be visible. The only feedback we had recieved was of an orange-ringed juvenile peregrine seen over Attenborouigh Nature Reserve (about 10 miles east of Derby). Offhand, I can't remember if that was last autumn or the autumn before - sorry.

Anonymous said...

OK, so I looked at the video instead - stunning! The call of adult peregrines is so thrilling - a sound that makes the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. For ringing feedback, it's up to all of us lot to keep our eyes open - not just for peregrines but for any bird that may have a ring on it. There may be general data available on the BTO site?