Some Recent Little OWL banding We have recently banded a number Little Owl Puli; Ruud & I checked the boxes in the Halswell area a couple of weeks ago. While the ones in Halswell itself, at the Quary and Domain were all empty the ones at the Cashmere Rd property were better. I am not sure why this is, perhaps there are too many nest sites already available, with holes in the old rock face and amongst the jumble of fallen rock. I know there are Owls there. At Cashmere Rd two boxes were in use the one that had been used last year at 4 eggs when first checked, but when we returned with ..read more

 Under the Guidance of Anita and Phil a new banding site has been created at the Styx Living Laboratory Trust field Centre at 75 Lower Styx Road. Anita as well as being the Regional Rep of Canterbury Birds NZ is the manager of this Field Centre. Phil is a Ranger with the CH-Ch City Council and as a L3 bander/trainer for Passerines is able to train trainees in the dark arts of the process. The hope is that enough suitable people can be trained to enable transfer of suitable species into relevant habitat in the city. A couple of trial sessions have been held and now with some improveme ..read more

 For a variety of reasons, I have done very little banding over the last few weeks, but we have nevertheless had some interesting birds. Both alive and dead. Here is a summary of some of what I think is the most interesting. AP-27099 A Silvereye that was banded at our Cashmere Rd site on 30 June 2022 and recaptured there a month later. On 27 August 2024 it was caught by a cat in Milton Rd, Mt Eden, Auckland. It was taken to a Vet but later died. This is a minimum distance of approx. 800km but of course it would have travelled much further. This is possibly the longest distance recorded by ..read more

 On Wednesday my 2 brothers and I had a Harrier banding session in the Lakeside area. Although it was a relatively short session it was pretty successful. We caught 10 new birds and made 5 recaptures of birds already banded. Two birds were caught twice and perhaps are slow learners. The number of new birds was a big surprise as this area has been regularly trapped over the last few years. Although most of them were young birds, there were also several older ones. An old male caught for the first time with grey primary's And the pale-yellow eye of an old bird I think it ..read more

 On Monday 25 March my twin brothers and I set traps to catch Harriers. Well actually one set the traps while we other two took a leisurely drive out to the Country. The first round of the traps was a little disappointing with a new bird and a Recap. After a coffee break thing picked up and we ended the day with 10 new birds banded and 4 recaptures. One of the recaps was only banded in the morning and then caught again in the afternoon in the same trap. Must be a bit of a slow learner. The twins with one of the birds.  The other three were a bit more interesting. One had be ..read more

 There has been a limited amount of banding in recent weeks with birds mostly feeding on the large amount of food available and not yet flocking to any extent. Harriers have only returned to this part of the country in any number in the last few weeks. On Friday we had a session at the Halswell Quarry at what is usually a reliable site but only managed to band 7 birds. Three each of Dunnock and Chaffinch, and a solitary Silvereye. All were new and most were young birds. Flight a relatively new bander looking happy with the first bird of the day. Looking even happier with t ..read more

 We haven't had any major banding sessions so far this year but have nevertheless banded a few birds. About 10 days ago Ruud and I banded 3 Kingfisher puli in a nest at Living Springs near Governers Bay. This is at least a month later than we have banded nestling Kingfishers before. Last Thursday Ruud and I went to the South Island Wildlife Hospital at Willowbank to band some rehabilitated birds before their release.  We banded 7 Little Owls and 4 Kingfishers. Most of the birds of both species seemed to have received their injuries from either having an accident on a road or flying i ..read more

 We have had no organised sessions for a while, mostly due to the sites we use at this time of year having very few birds. So mostly news about Little Owls and the banding of the usual Kingfisher Puli. We were asked about six months ago if we could erect a couple of Owl nesting boxes at a site development where there were going to be several mature trees removed. The locals were concerned about the welfare of the resident Little Owls. Two boxes were duly erected then, when I went to check them about a month ago, it was found that one had been stolen. This theft must have taken some doing ..read more

 Over the last few days we have banded seven Little Owlets in two of our specially designed nesting boxes. This is our highest number banded in a year. The first 3 to be banded were in a box on the outskirts of Rangiora. This box was erected about 18 months ago and appeared to have been used last spring but unfortunately access problems prevented us from checking it out properly. We were more successful this year. On Monday we were able to gain access and got a bit of a surprise as the three chicks were of a bandable size. I had expected them to be much smaller with their mother still in ..read more

 We haven't had any sessions for a couple of weeks but there have been a number of young birds receive their bling. Starling, - we have banded 17 puli, all were in nest boxes. Phil banded 10 in his boxes at his place in Motukarara  and I have banded 7. 3 in a neighbour's box and 4 in one of my boxes. We are likely to band some more when we recheck the Little Owl boxes, as many have been taken over by Starlings. One of the newly banded Starlings. Song Thrush - 9 banded, 5 in a nest at the Quarry. The nest was found during our last session, but the chicks were too small to ba ..read more