Cream Tea Birding: Colour-rings, Osprey & Bearded Tit

Thursday, 3 April 2025

Colour-rings, Osprey & Bearded Tit

Spring is slowly starting for us here on the Otter Estuary. Local highlights over the last few weeks have been as follows:

Little Ringed Plover - Up to 4 birds with my first of the year on 13th March.

Sand Martin: My first of the year 20th March.

Sandwich Tern: My first of the year 21st March.

Osprey: A bird fishing briefly and headed north up river at 7.25pm on 30th March.

Willow Warbler: My first of the year in the garden on 30th March.

Northern Wheatear: My first of the year on 1st April.

Other highlights have included the loyal wintering Spotted Redshank and Greenshank as well as up to 18 Black-tailed Godwits through March. Shelduck numbers have started to increase again with my all time high count for the site on 23rd March with 67 birds.

Most surprising bird so far this year was a lone male Bearded Tit that I found today (3rd April). Amazingly in the same spot as the birds that were around in October: See HERE

Colour-ringed Shelduck A41: Exciting news that this bird I saw on 28th March 2025 is the first sighting since it was ringed at Seaton Wetlands on 11/01/2020. Thanks to Ian Stanbridge for confirming the history. More can be found on this project here: https://axeestuaryringinggroup.blogspot.com/p/blog-page.html

Colour-ringed Dunlin YA: This Dunlin on the Otter was not quite as exciting! It was first ringed at Dawlish Warren in Jan 2025 and had been seen on the Otter previously, but not reported for a while. See: https://www.dcwrg.org.uk/recoveries/dunlin

Colour-ringed Curlew: OT has made it into April! It has remained loyal to the Otter Estuary NR since Rick and I first found this Dartmoor head-started bird on 16th Sep 2024. It will be interesting to see if it stays for the summer before hopefully breeding next year as a 2 year old. We will wait and see....

More: https://www.dartmoor.gov.uk/wildlife-and-heritage/wildlife/curlew-conservation