More photos & information about the Karupelv Valley Project in the arctic

Three members of our Schlammwiss Team (Dave, Charel and Max) visited the Federsee lake in southwestern Germany the 26th and 27th of May. The lake itself is surrounded by a spectacular reed belt and vast moorland, the water surface itself, which is only about 2 meters deep, is only accessible by a 1,5 km long wooden boardwalk. Since the area is an important hibernating, resting and breeding site for many bird species among others 200 breeding pairs of Whinchats and 18 breeding pairs of Marsh harriers (according Nabu 2014), it has been declared a Special Protection Area.

We’ve seen lots of interesting species, some well known as Reed Warblers, Savi’s Warblers, Great Reed Warblers and Reed Buntings, rather uncommon species such as Whinchats, Common Terns, Ruffs and marsh harriers. Furthermore we were quite lucky to observe rare migrants such as six female red-footed falcons and one Arctic Tern!

All in all it was a perfect Weekend despite of rain and I strongly recommend visiting the spot!

Autor: Max Steimetz

After two bad seasons in 2013 and 2014, we accompanied this year two experienced ornithologists who controlled nestboxes of Tengmalm’s Owl (Aegolius funereus) in a forest of the Hunsrück in Rhineland-Palatinate. Because of the good food supply this year, the Tengmalm’s owl is likely to experience a better breeding season. This nocturne species has a body height of only 24-26 cm and it primarily subsists on small rodents such as mice. Its habitat consists of low mountain ranges between 450 m and 800 m above sea-level. The Tengmalm’s owl mainly prefers coniferous forests mixed with leaf trees including old nesting holes of the Black Woodpecker. Unfortunately, the brood of the Tengmalm’s owl is threatened by martens which climb up trees and eat their clutches.

Depending on the weather conditions, the females generally start breeding in April. A few chicks had hatched already when the ringer checked the nestboxes.  In this ringing session only the females were ringed. A recapture of a female or a nest-ringed young owl is rare but there are already a few recaptures of Tengmalm’s owl in Belgium. They hatched and were ringed in the region Eifel, which shows that this owl species migrates between different low mountain ranges.

Members of Schlammwiss Ringing Team met early on Sunday 22 March to hit the road to Genk in Belgium for the annual Ringday organised by the Belgian Royal Institute of natural sciences.Apart from the regular bird ringing and other scientific projects, the Ringing team makes sure to attend these sort of conferences to keep in contact with other ornithologists and update itself on recent studies and research on birds and bird ringing.

We arrived around 11 am where we attended a guided tour of the Het Wik nature reserve. An interesting biotope with marshes and reed beds surrounded by mixed forests which provide excellent habitat for birds. We were given information about ringing and management on the site.

At 2pm we started with the first talk which was about the ringing results of the reserve Het Wik, it followed by a very interesting talk about why bird ringers should take measurements on birds , what the measurements means, when and how. This talk solidified our beleifs and our insistance to take regular and accurate measurements. We were given several examples of cases where the measurements makes difference in species , populations and races of particular bird taxa. Measurements also help to determine sex and age in some species. A fine example is weight of a bird in comparison to fat levels, this can show whether the bird is migrating or not.

The third talk was also of high importance for all bird ringers it concerned the moult of birds, a must know to all bird ringers and trainees that ring birds regularly. Bird moult can tell a lot, it shows different stages in a birds life so knowing how birds moult is one of the biggest tool for ringers, ornithologists and scientists. We are used to ringing passerines so hearing a talk about catching and ringing waterbirds for 10 years was interesting for us.

It concerns the reserve of Sint Agatha Rode where they use a water cage trap with food to attarct ducks , of special interests was the information about the recaptures and the data provided from this activity as there are not a lot of ringing stations that focus on ringing water birds.

The last talk was about building a bal chatri trap for birds of prey. This is a special trap that needs a special permission to operate.

Overall, this ringday was a huge success from the social aspect for our team and most importantly for the opportunity to learn and share knowledge on birds and bird ringing. Member's of Schlammwiss team have also attend last year's Ringday and a symposium for birdmonitoring at Mainz University in November 2014.

Autor: Joseph Dunlop

On thuesday the 19. march we (Jim, Raoul, Charel and Guy(Birdringingstation 'Schifflange')) went to Belgium to see the Palla's leaf warbler (Phylloscopus proregulus). We found the bird together with Goldcrests (Regulus regulus), Firecrests (Regulus ignicapillus) and Chiffchaffs (Phylloscopus collybita) in a big wetland area.

Autor: Charel Klein

As one of the most mystical birds, the spotted nutcracker spends all of his time in coniferous forests. The main nutrition source are cones. It's fascinating to which degree, evolution enabled this species to occupy an ecological niche that has hardly any biodiversity.

Apart from the spotted nutcracker, we were able to observe some red crossbills (Loxia curvirostra).

Autor: Dave Lutgen

Around 3 million Bramblings (Fringilla montifringilla) found a roosting place in Hasel/Schopfheim in Germany near Switzerland. These birds come from the north and take the opportunity to feed on beechnuts. Because of the hard winter in the high mountains of Switzerland it's impossible to pass this way. This is why so many birds are roosting at one place.
To find some food, the birds are going in the forest around and eat around 80t of beechnuts each day..

It's a big show when thousands of birds are coming from every side to a few hectare large forest. Common buzzard (Buteo buteo), Goshawk (Accipiter gentilis),  Sparrowhawk (Accipiter nisus) and Peregrine falcon (Falco peregrinus) are common guests every evening and try to feed on some of the Bramblings.

3 Members of the schlammwissteam (Dave, Max and Charel) and  Christian Stange (german ornithologist) went twice to have a look at this very special show 

Autor: Charel Klein

On Saturday and Sunday 17th and 18th of January,

Two membes of the Ringingstation 'Schlammwiss' (Dave and Charel) went to Radolfzell (Germany), in order to participate at the Bird ringing license course of the ‘Vogelwarte Radorfzell’. The course explains the judicial situation, the banding material and the handling of birds. Furthermore, they tested our knowledge on padded birds and we made a visit of the attached Max-Planck Institute.

They did this course in order to support Bird ringing projects in Germany and maybe to get started with their own projects. 

Autor: Dave Lutgen

On January the 10th, the Schlammwiss-Team comprising Jim, Dave, Cédric, Nicole and Niklas visited another bird-ringing team in Bonn, Germany.

The local team around the ornithologists Esther Koch, Victor Corman and Sönke Twietmeyer as well as many other helping hands met at a roosting place near the river Rhine to ring rose-ringed parakeets (Psittacula krameri). Esther Koch has already examined the influence of the rose-ringed parakeets on cave breeders in Bonn in her diploma thesis.

With a current population size of approximately 1.300 individuals in Bonn, she found that the parakeets do not pose a significant threat to native cave breeders.

The parakeet’s native range is India and Africa but the wild populations in Bonn, and also those in Cologne and Brussels, are descendants from individuals which succeeded in escaping from private keepers and zoos.

In order to learn more about this bright green colored bird concerning age, sex and their life history in cities of temperate zones, the team of experts decided to continue the study on the rose-ringed parakeet. They are usually being captured with standard mist-nets for song birds. For parakeets, these nets are more effective than nets with wider meshes because this way the parakeets lie loosely in the pockets and can be removed easily by experienced bird-ringers. The disadvantage is, that many of those caught turn around in the net pocket and escape.

The whole team which included more than 20 bird ringers, scientists and helpers placed two nets near a group of plane trees not far away from the river Rhine. Plane trees are the favourite roosting trees of that species. As soon as the night fell, swarms of starlings, carrion crows and jackdaws settled down on the branches of the surrounding trees. Shortly afterwards, small groups of parakeets gathered on trees along the banks of the Rhine and places nearby. As it got darker, more parakeets flew in. Typical for their behavior before roosting time, groups of parakeets rush almost on ground level at high speed towards the trees and then rising again onto the branches where they loudly inform their conspecifics of their presence.

That is the moment in which the parakeets were caught. The team split up into small groups to remove the birds from the nets to ring and examine them. Others stayed hidden but close enough to the nets to observe further fly-ins. Regarding the strong force of their beak that even allows them to crack nuts, we took care of ringing them with rings made out of steel. Simple aluminium would rapidly fall victim to the beak’s destructive force. It became clear very soon that is impossible to ring parakeets without using protective handgloves. Indeed, their strong beak can cause painfull injuries. Additionally, it is hard to put the ring on the bird’s leg because it is just a tiny bit longer than the ring itself. After the ringing, the wing length and the length of the middle pair of tail feathers were measured. That method showed that males have longer tail feathers than females. Then the weight of the birds was taken and their wing was spread on a black background to take a photo. Lots of wing photos will allow to see differences in feather characteristics for age determination.

To really find out whether a non-male couloured bird is a female or a juvenile, the scientists took a cloacal swab of each bird for a molecular examination in a laboratory. Moreover, that same sample gives information about the bird’s health. The exact age of a rose-ringed parakeet cannot be determined by pure vision. We know however that adult males only get a rose coloured ring around their neck during their third calendar year.

Concerning age determination, there is another unusual characteristic whose occurrence depends on the season of catching and the past weather conditions. Partially, the rose-ringed parakeets showed signs of frost bite on the underside of their feet. Claws and toes can fall of in case of long term frost periods. Knowing that, a young parakeet hatched the year before, it can be distinguished from adults by the good condition of its feet on. If the toes are still on in January, the winter weather has been rather soft in that year.

Although the weather was windy and dark clouds and short rain showers accompanied the ringing action in the late afternoon, the team had great luck with at least six rose-ringed parakeets that made a little stop-over before they went into their roosting trees.

For the Schlammwiss team this was the first contact with this species. An exceptional experience for all of us – and probably not the last.

THANKS for the impressing insights into the handling and ringing of rose-ringed parakeets to Sönke Twietmeyer and the whole team in Bonn.

Autor: Nicole Thien

On the 30th of December a student of Biology, who started to screen systematically the rocks along the Meuse River, spotted a Wallcreeper in Dinant. This bird of the high mountains is largely resident and its closest breeding area is in the Alps. There are some rare reports about wintering birds in the Netherlands or England but it’s very exceptional to see it so far afield. The last record in Belgium was in 1988. Ornithologists from Belgium and the neighbor countries travelled to this small Belgian city to have a look at this special guest.

Among them two Luxemburgish guys, who couldn’t resist to add this bird on their lifelist. The weather conditions were good and we have found it quite easily on the rocks near the citadel of the city center. Nevertheless, Dave and me, we were impressed by the difficulty to spot it, despite the striking flight feathers.  For about half an hour we observed the bird climbing around the mountains and flying in its butterfly style.

Jim Schmitz visited this bird on the second january with Guy Mirgain and Isabelle Zwick (from the Bridringingstation Brill).

Autor: Mettenhoven Raoul

From the 26th of December to the 30th of December, 8 members of the Birdringingstation went to the Netherlands, in order to do sea watching and having a look at thousands of ducks and geese. We went to Zeeland, a province located in the South-West of the Netherlands. Most of the province is composed of islands, which are located for the most part below sea level. 

On the first day we started at 7 a.m. in Luxembourg and reached the first spot at 12 o’clock. The first spot were wetlands around the Veerse Meer; this spot gave us the opportunity to see different kinds of plovers (Grey plover (Pluvialis squatarola), European golden plover (Pluvialis apricaria), Common ringed plover (Charadrius hiaticula)), the usual oystercatchers, some Common Redshank (Tringa totanus) and some Knots (Calidris canutus).

Highlight at this spot were two Red-breasted geese (Branta ruficollis), which was travelling around with a group of Brent geese (Branta bernicla). The stop of the day was the Brouwersdam, which is one of seven constructions, whose goal is to protect the Rhine–Meuse–Scheldt delta from floods and storms.

At the Brouwersdam we managed to see different kinds of divers (Red-throated diver (Gavia stellata), Black-throated loon (Gavia arctica), Horned grebe (Podiceps auritus), and Black-necked grebe (Podiceps nigricollis)), some Gulls and some Shorebirds (Purple sandpiper (Calidris maritima), Ruddy turnstone (Arenaria interpres) and Bar-tailed godwit (Limosa lapponica)).

During the night there was a snow storm, which meant that at 7.30 a.m., when we left the houses we had very bad weather conditions. On the second day, the first spot was the Brouwersdam, where we managed to see some sea ducks (Common scoter (Melanitta nigra), Common eider (Somateria mollissima), and Common goldeneye (Bucephala clangula)).

As the weather conditions were very bad at sea, we drove inland with the intention of seeing more birds in flooded marsh areas. The area which we chose is called Zierickzee; it’s a mixture of fields and flooded marsh areas. At this spot, we managed to see different duck species (Northern pintail (Anas acuta), Northern shoveller (Anas clypeata), Common teal (Anas crecca) and Eurasian widgeon (Anas penelope)), furthermore we were able to see different shorebird species (Pied avocet (Recurvirostra avosetta) and Northern lapwing (Vanellus vanellus)).

At the end of the day a highlight was a Northern harrier (Circus cyaneus) crossing our way.

The third day started with a great sunrise at temperatures of -1.5°C. As light conditions were very good, we took the opportunity to do sea watching: beneath thousands of sea ducks, we were able to observe a group of playing harbour seals (Phoca vitulina). Around 11 o’clock we headed towards the Deltapark Neeltje Jans; at this spot we tried to see the common shag (Phalacrocorax aristotelis) and a Red phalarope (Phalaropus fulicarius) but unfortunately we were unable to find these birds. Not very happy, we still continued and managed to see Redwings (Turdus iliacus) and some Eurasian rock pipits (Anthus petrosus).

With the day coming to an end we spent the last hours on the Brouwersdam, benefitting from the low tide and a very calm sea to observe roosting birds.

On the fourth day the sky was cloudy and temperatures quite low; this made us head towards field observations. This means, that we spent the day scanning different fields in order to see different goose and swan species. At the end of the day, we managed to see a Greater White-fronted Goose (Anser albifrons), a Bean Goose (Anser fabalis), a Greylag Goose (Anser anser) and a big group of Barnacle Geese (Branta leucopsis). In addition to this we saw some Water pipits (Anthus spinoletta), some Meadow pipits (Anthus pratensis) and a Common Kingfisher (Alcedo atthis).

The fifth day was the last day of our trip, but as the weather was quite good we spent some more hours on the Brouwersdam. At 11 o’clock, we met a group of Dutch birdwatchers staring at the harbour. As exchanges of information are usual in ornithology one of them came to us and told us that they were observing a Black guillemot (Cepphus grylle). This bird was very special for most of us; it’s a species which usually breeds in the north (Ireland, England and Scotland) and is hardly ever seen in the Netherlands. Furthermore, as we were able to observe the bird at a distance of 15 meters a lot of people took the opportunity to take pictures.

Finally, I’m able to say that we had a great trip, the objective of which was to observe and identify the biodiversity of birds in the Netherlands. In addition to this, we were able to transmit our knowledge to some motivated guys in our team. All in all, we were able to see 102 different species.

Autor: Dave Lutgen

On Tuesday 9 December 2014, me (Joseph Dunlop) and Charel Klein, left Luxembourg early in the morning to head to the Belgian coast city of Nieuwpoort to take part in a cannon netting activity aimed in catching and ringing coastal birds. The activity was organised by the Belgian Royal Institute of Natural sciences and was managed by ringer Norbert Roothaert. We arrived around midday and the team was already in place more than 20 ringers and volunteers were present. The nets were set on the beach and the circuit was in place while the wait started for the birds to come on the beach as the tide retreats. While we were waiting, we observed several hundreds of oystercatchers and Lapwings, good numbers of Dunlins, Cormorants, Turnstones and Gulls. The wait was long as we had to be sure that the tide was in the right place, firstly, so that we get the maximum birds possible and most important that it is safe for the birds.  When it was the right time , the switch was hit and the nets were shot.  73 oystercatchers were ringed, 16 recaptures. 2 more than 22 yrs old !! It was a great experience , the teamwork was excellent in making the process fast and efficient.  Routine measurements were taken on the birds and we learned a lot about ageing waders.  It was worth the long drive, it is always great to make an experience like this different from our routine of ringing passerines.

Autor: Joseph Dunlop

Hey everybody, today we skipped one ringing activity in order to visit a meeting of Constant Effort Sites (CES) in Mainz organised by Ismega, who celebrated their 10th anniversary. They got some very interesting results and a very special pleasure was the presentation about Birdmonitoring in the 21th century presented by Franz Barlein responsible of the 'Vogelwarte Helgoland'.

Another interesting presentation has been the CES in Trier by Dr Ortwin Elle, who visits our ringingstation regulary with the students of the University of Trier.

A big thanks to the Ismega who organised the meeting and to our team Jim Schmitz,Charel Klein, Nicole Thien, Cedric Brodin and Dave Lutgen

Autor: Dave Lutgen

At our station we have many people working and helping on the site and by all the activitys! Young and old, birdringers and trainees! Some of the trainees work already  several years at the birdringstation.. and start now to go abroad to see other/new places, see different birds, meet new people and learn other techniques!

The story of a trainee:

Hi,
My name is Charel Klein. I am student for forestmanagement and environment (minor protection of nature) at the university Freiburg im Breisgau in Germany. I started 2011 with ornithology at the birdringingstation Schlammwiss.

I visited already some little birdringingstation in France and worked together with Christian Stange in Freiburg but I decided to visite my first 'big' birdringingstation this year. I found 'Col de Bretolet' in Switzerland and wrote a mail to join them! Unfortunaley I was a bit late so I haven't got a place... but in october I got a mail to join them!!  On friday 17th I drove to Freiburg and later on to Barme from where I walked 2 hours (didn't find the correct way..) up to 1923m . This year Sarah Althaus and Marco Thoma were working for the whole season at the Col the Bretolet and have been supported by helping volunteers.

Information about Col de Bretolet:

Since 1958 the ornithological station Sempach  makes studies about  bird migration in autumn. They ring every year about 10 000 - 20 000 birds with more than 100 different species. By every controll they take the date and time for exact studies about the migration. From other measurments , size, weight, fat and muscle they analyse the physical condition of the birds.
(information: http://www.vogelwarte.com)

The nets are open 24to 24 hours. The nets are on the back of a mountain in  a long line over a pass where all the birds  try to fly over. You can  hear and see many birds arriving in the valley and try to fly over the mountain. With usual mist nets and highnets (which can get change at night and dayposition) they catch  the  birds. A controle is made every hour. Everybody goes to the nets to take out  the birds . They mark the netnumber, netpocket and time (wintertime). Later on they bring the birds to the second cabin where  two motivated birdringers  wait to ring them and take  measurements.

Beside the data of birds they look also at the migration of moths and bats (which get caught in the net).

Place:

We had two cabins there. 3 bedrooms, a kitchen and a birdringingroom. The only heat place was the kitchen were we cooked all together. The shower was outside with cold water and the toilet too but you had an amazing view.... You don't need more!

When I arrived the weather was pretty good and hot! But it changed on wednesday.. It started with rain and fog and ended up with 40 cm snow... so i had everything :)

Birds:

The first days we had many birds like: Erithacus rubecula, Fringilla coelebs, Fringilla montifringilla, Coccothraustes coccothraustes; later we had many tits, most of them were Cyanistes caeruleus, Periparus ater! We had a day with more than 1 000 birds and one with no birds

I took the chance to benefit from a lot of new species (for me)  and to make a photo-collection for identification.

All in all:

It was an amazing place! with very nice and interesting people! I was really happy to have  the chance to join them and a big THANKS  to Sarah and Marco!

Maybe i see them back.. next year ;)

Autor: Charel Klein