Sunday 4 March 2012

A welcome drop of rain

It's not often that residents of this part of the world are glad when it rains but if you want to catch woodcock it's a big help. This week, as part of a larger project in conjunction with the Woodcock Network and GWCT, Mike Sherman and myself were trying to fit ten geolocators to woodcock to find out more about the whereabouts of their breeding and migration routes. The geolocators were provided by GWCT and kindly funded by Sir Edward Dashward, and they record the daily positions of the birds as they travel to their summer quarters.

Two attempts earlier in the week weren't that productive with only single woodcock caught each night. The reason for this was calm clear conditions making close approach to the birds impossible, but last night's thick cloud and rain produced ideal conditions and we now have nine of the ten birds with geolocators and ready to go. Hopefully we catch them again next winter and find out what they have been up to all year.

All ready to go.

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