On our recent holiday to the Llyn Peninsula in North Wales,we visited an area opposite Bardsey Island known as Braich Y Pwll.
This area we had visited on a couple of occasions previously in the hope to see those beautiful red billed Corvids,the Chough,of which we have been successful on every visit.
So on the 12th of September we arrived and quickly located at least 14 birds feeding in the area and we gained some cracking views of the birds,which included 3 carrying colour rings.
The first two we encountered were feeding in close proximity of each other and i was pretty sure they were a pair.
One bird had a grey colour ring on its left leg and a yellow colour ring on its right leg,with the second bird having a black colour ring over a blue colour ring on it's left leg and a grey colour ring on its right leg.
The third bird was seen near the car park and was particularly tame,allowing a very close approach as it fed.This bird had a ash grey ring inscribed with 3N over a white ring on it's left leg and a orange ring on it's right leg.
That evening i sent an e.mail to Adrienne Stratford who i knew was an expert on Choughs and was colour ringing the birds on the llyn and on Bardsey Island.
After a week without any internet access,Adrienne got back to me and gave me the following details on the 3 birds,which was most interesting.
The first bird with the single ash grey colour ring on its left leg and a yellow colour ring on its right leg was a 5 year old male which was ringed on Bardsey Island.He has held territory and attempted to nest with 3 different partners at 3 different sites,but has had no success as yet and not really settled down,although he had never been seen any further afield than Rhiw.He has incidentally lost one of his colour rings.
The second bird with the black over blue on the left leg and ash grey on the right leg,was a 9 year old female which had also been ringed on Bardsey.
She is a resident Aberdaron nesting bird since 2017 and has been successful in raising young every year,although in 2018,that was on the second attempt after an early nest was washed out by spring gales.She has raised a total of 13 young so far,which have all been colour-ringed except last years young,due to covid restrictions.She has always nested with an un-ringed male partner,but probably not the same one throughout,as she spent last autumn paired to the previous bird,but by January she was with an un-ringed partner again.
Usually Choughs are both faithfull to both partner and nest site,so probably she was widowed last summer and that this years unringed male,was a different bird.It looks like she may have been widowed for a second time seeing as that she is now back with the previous colour ringed male again.
The final bird ash grey inscribed with 3N over a white ring and orange ring on the right leg was ringed as a juvenile female from a brood of 3 birds,from a local nest at Pen y Cil this year.
We made a second visit on the 14th,seeing a huge flock of 58 birds,but the only colour-ringed bird we encountered,was the juvenile female 3N again,feeding in the same area we saw her on the 12th.
A big thankyou must go to Adrienne for all the information and helping us get a window on the lives of these wonderfull birds and i look forward to my next visit to North Wales to see these cracking birds.
