Chicks ringed, Two Cathy photos & WP Update

This evening (30th) in a delightfully wind-free and sunny gap in an otherwise very wet day (it's raining again now!), our four chicks were quickly and successfully ringed, thanks to the services of Martin (the abseiler) and Ant (the licenced ringer). Ant thought there were definitely two females and one male with the fourth bird possibly of either sex....since this bird was intermediate in weight and leg width. Time may help is decide.

The orange colour rings applied were 012, 013, 014 and 015.

The Evening Telegraph photographer took his photos back to the newspaper office post haste and it seems likely they will be in tomorrow's paper.

My photos show Martin about to go 'over the edge' and one of the chicks in the middle of the ringing process. Better photos of the chicks will follow soon hopefully....

Nick Brown (Derbyshire Wildlife Trust)

Ps. Someone asked to see a photo of Cathy as she is now - so here's one taken on Mon

day by Joyce Sawford.

And a second one shows Cathy with a young admirer - Thomas, taken by his father Tony.

Her plumage has certainly changed - she looks a lot more like an adult now. Note those

lovely feathers on her legs and the clearer and darker marks on her face - especially her moustache!

Report on Friday's Watch Point:
It was a beautiful sunny day today with over 60 people arriving at the Watch Point. They came from far and wide, including Brighton and Worcester. It was also good to see so many children and young people enjoying watching the peregrines. The telescopes were put to good use as there was plenty to see, with the chicks showing well on the platform.

We were also treated to some fantastic aerial displays by the adult birds. The male arrived back around 11.45 am carrying food, which prompted the female to fly from the tower. Both birds were circling and diving for several minutes, before the food was finally taken to the platform and the chicks were fed by the female.

Later in the morning a buzzard was seen flying high up above the tower causing the adult birds to take flight again. There were stunning views of the male flying directly at the buzzard, with the female also calling angrily and circling close by. The buzzard was eventually driven off and didn't return! As we left one of the adult birds was perched at the top of the tower, whilst the chicks appeared settled at the back of the scrape. Many thanks to everyone who made donations and signed the visitors book today.

Helen and Joyce
John Salloway's photo shows a buzzard turned upside down to fend off a peregrine attack. It was taken a few years ago.

Ringing the chicks and an update

An example of  a ringed chick from 2007

Everything went well. The chicks were ringed and we left the tower an hour after

arrival. The local paper should have a big feature on the ringing in tomorrow. Pictures to follow on the blog..... and thanks to Ant and Martin for their professional services! Chick ringing will take place this evening if we possibly can get it done now the rain has finally stopped, between 6-8pm.

So, if you see a rope and a pair of legs dangle into view on the web cams and the chicks disappear into a rucksack, hopefully between about 6.20 and 6.40pm, fear not!

It's all part of the plan....

The chicks will be just the right age to be ringed.

Any younger and the rings could slip off their legs, any bigger and we risk the chicks flapping out of the nest platform - whereas what they will do at this age is to crouch in the back of the gravel and stay quite still until handled.

They are put into a rucksack which is quickly lowered down to the nave roof below where the ringer is stationed. After ringing, the chicks are returned to the nest. The adult birds usually return to them within half an hour or so (often sooner) and life continues as if nothing had happened. A full report on the ringing will appear here later in the evening. There will not be any video clips though this year, for the reasons explained in earlier posts.

My photo shows the very first chick to be colour ringed (001) - back in 2007. We did ring the chicks in 2006 but didn't have any colour rings then. Now that we do, we give each bird a British Trust for Ornithology (BTO) ring on its right leg and an orange colour ring on its left - as you can see in the photo. The BTO ring has a unique number on it so that if the bird is found dead or injured, the finder can report the number back to the BTO.

The colour ring would enable us to identify the bird later if, for example, it were to start nesting at another site somewhere. The big, simple number (in this case 001) can been seen through a telescope - so we can be sure which bird it is without having to try to catch it |(virtually impossible with adult peregrines anyway!). The colour and numbers (as opposed to letters) are unique to Derbyshire ringed peregrines. The fact that the ring is on the left leg means that the bird has come from the cathedral. Any other juvenile peregrine ringed elsewhere in Derbyshire will have the rings on the other legs - BTO on left, colour on right.

The ringer has ringed all the chicks at the cathedral since 2006. He is very experienced and has ringed many peregrines and other raptors in his time and there is absolutely no risk to the bird. Ringing has given us so much vital information about birds since the national ringing scheme was started many years ago. For more information go to the BTO's website at www.bto.org .

With luck there will be a picture story in the Derby Evening Telegraph on Tuesday or perhaps Wednesday, depending.

Nick Brown (Derbyshire Wildlife Trust)

Ps Monday Event Update: Despite continual rain, we've had a busy day today with over 300 people coming to the cathedral for tower tours and to see Cathy. She behaved very well and everyone was delighted to see her. Big thanks to Colin for bringing her down! We managed about an hour of Watch Point duty around midday before the rain became harder once more....

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

Hobby ringing

On local TV last night they showed a hobby chick being ringed. What was unusual for a bird that usually breeds in old crow nests in trees was that this chick had been hatched 12 metres up on a high voltage pylon close to a power station.

A nest basket had been placed up there for the hobbies but I would guess the birds originally adopted a crow nest on the pylon. Peregrines also occasionally nest in such locations, similarly taking over old crow nests.

As with the New Forest hobby's (see previous post for web cam link), there was only one chick reared.

To see the clip go to http://www.bbc.co.uk/eastmidlandstoday/index.shtml and click on watch again / last night's programme on the right side of the screen.

The photo, courtesy of Ed Drewitt, shows peregrine chicks in Poland somewhere reared in an artificial 'basket' though on what type of structure I can't recall exactly.

Nick (DWT)

Ringing feedback

Herewith the first photo's from last night's ringing of the chicks and further feedback and answers to questions posed in the comments.

The top photo shows Martin reaching across to grab the chicks and put them into the red rucksack in which they were lowered to the nave roof, where Ant ringed them.

First then, we seem to have one female and three males. Because of the windy conditions last night (to put it mildly) we carried out the ringing as quickly as we could and only visually checked the chicks leg sizes rather than measuring them. But the consensus was that there was only one female...her feet were much bigger and her tarsus much broader than the other three despite the difference in ages.

The close up below shows one of the males biting Ant as he was putting the ring on! Also see how the dark feather quills are appearing on its wings and tail.

Second: the female falcon flew round the tower calling loudly while ringing was taking place but this is normal. Only minutes after we left the tower and nave roof, the female was back on the platform with her chicks who were again huddled together in the corner of the nest trying to keep out of the wind! Incidentally, last year the male was nowhere to be seen while the ringing was taking place. At least this year he was flying about, albeit further off and silently.....

The four chicks were given orange/red colour rings numbered 03, 04, 05 and 07 (ring 06 broke and was not used).....01 and 02 were the numbers given to the two chicks in 2007 - the first year we put colour rings on...see the photo of 001 in the previous blog entry.
A big thanks to Martin and Ant for their services and skills and everyone else who helped us.

Nick B (DWT)

Follow these links to read how to watch our new live a/v stream

• read an overview of the peregrine project
• find out about buying the brand new DVD: "The Peregrines of Derby Cathedral")
• add your name to our mailing list see many more pictures on Froona's very detailed blog over in Holland (both from our webcams and from many others around the world)

Interruption to pictures

The ringing of the chicks happened today from (17:47 to 18:45 local time), and there was an interruption to the service which normally lets you see and hear the birds while it took place. This meant the pictures were frozen for an hour or so.

Update: Ringing was successfully completed by 18:45 (with just one abseil rope getting a bit stuck for a while). The Streamdays image stream has now returned, though we still only have audio on the live stream. The parent bird returned to the nest platform immediately the ringers had left, which is what we would have expected.

So, what have we got? Well, a phone call from the tower has just reported that Ant and Martin (our two licenced ringers) believe we have three male peregrine chicks and one female.

As well as making the ringers feel less "under the spotlight", we were concerned that someone watching the web cams may not be aware that ringing was taking place (human arms and legs would suddenly appear at the platform) and could think there was an attempt to steal the chicks and panic and ring the police (though we have already given notice to Derbyshire police that ringing would be taking place today).

Now that ringing is complete we'll let you know in more detail how it went, and also post photos of the chicks as soon as we can....and at least the dangling prey item obscuring the view has been removed!

The photo here shows one of the two 2007 chicks with its numbered colour ring. It also had a small metal ring on the more distant leg. The colour ring is big enough to read the number through a telescope but loose on the leg and in no way a hindrance to the bird. It means that, should this bird perch somewhere where someone can see the ring and read the number, eg on a building in say Nottingham, we will know where our Derby offspring are. Even if they can only see the (unique) colour, we will know it was a Derby-bred bird (peregrines colour ringed elsewhere have a different colour).


The metal ring is a standard ring which simply states 'contact Brit. Museum' and has a unique number such that if the bird is found injured or dead or is recaptured, its exact identity and origin will be known.


Colour rings do fall off sometimes, the colour fades and the number becomes difficult to read, so both rings are essential to maximise the information we can get back from these chicks in the future.


The British Trust for Ornithology (BTO) organises and supervises the ringing of wild birds in the UK. See their website for more about bird ringing in general. They are fully aware of what we do at Derby.

Well rung

The ringing went well and we had a lovely evening to do it. Both chicks now have bright orange rings on their left legs numbered 001 and 002. They were both females - heavy and healthy chicks with very big feet.

While we were there, the female flew round the top of the tower, screaming at us. The male flew up very high and then disappeared!

Not long after we left the tower, the female came back and landed on the platform, looking all around her. There was a temporary problem with the cameras but all now seems to be working well again.

The photo shows the orange colour ring 001 on the left leg of the first chick to be ringed, with the duller metal ring on the right leg behind. The orange colour is unique to Derbyshire-ringed peregrines. The number on the colour ring identifies the individual.

Meanwhile the cathedral bell ringers were busy practicing at the same time, so altogether a busy and successful night of ringing! A special thanks to Martin for abseiling down and lowering the chicks to Ant on the nave roof, who then ringed them. Thanks to head verger Tony for opening all the doors and giving up his evening to help us.

Ringing the chicks - disruption likely

Please note that we will be ringing the two chicks this evening (June 1st). There will be some disruption to the web cam pictures for about an hour while the ringing is in progress. We will disable the cameras, otherwise viewers will see parts of the abseiler suddenly appearing on the platform and will probably start to panic, thinking there was an intruder!

The female will certainly fly about screaming at us. However, only minutes after the chicks have been replaced on the platform, she will return to brood them and life will return to normal.

The licenced ringers, are very experienced at this work. They have been ringing peregrines and other raptors for many years and what they will do tonight is quite routine for them.

More details about the chicks, what sex they are and the details of their rings will follow later.

Note that the photo shows one of LAST year's chicks being ringed.

Ringing the chicks

Last year, the three chicks (one male and two females) were ringed when they were about 20 days old on 15th June. The photo shows one of the birds, probably a young female, judging by the large size of its feet, just after it had been ringed (photo Tony Grantham).

We had hoped to be able to use colour rings as well as the numbered, metal BTO ring but we were too late getting some from Canada where they are made. We also hadn't sorted out and agreed with the BTO a unique (Derby) colour that would distinguish our birds from those colour-ringed elsewhere..... even at a distance.

This year we aim to do better!