Vikings with rings!

Waxwing. Kenneth Hindmarch.

I'm grateful to Ken for allowing me to post this photograph of the ringed Waxwing. I'm also grateful for the information Ken has forwarded to me of some results from the winter influx of Waxwing in 2008/9 and an even more interesting one from a bird ringed in 2005. I have also been given permission to post a few details for our interest on Birds2blog.

YRW was ringed at Bridge of Don, Scotland on 9 November 2008 and found 12 days later on 21 November in Barrow, Cumbria.

OLO and BGB were also both ringed as YRW above, OLO was found on 6 January 2009 in Essex, and BGB was found in County Dublin, Ireland and was one of two colour-ringed birds to cross the Irish sea this winter.

BB and RW were both ringed at Allenvale, Scotland on 11 November 2008, BB was found at Skipton in N.Yorkshire on 5 December, and RW was found in Derbyshire on 4 February, then in N.Lincolnshire on 14 April.

OWG was ringed in Dyce, Scotland on 13 November 2008 and found in Nottingham on 29 December. 

WLR was ringed in Aberdeen on 22 November 2008 and found 17 days later at Dalston, Cumbria on 9 December.

Since the last week in October thousands of Waxwings have arrived and spread across many parts of Britain, this appears to be an earlier and much larger invasion than that of 2008 and very similar to the invasion of 2004 when a bird was ringed in Aberdeen, Scotland in March 2005, this bird was found the following winter in February 2006 at a site named Alyabevskiy, Sovetskiy, in the county of Khanty-Mansi in Russia.

If you think I've made any errors in this data I'd be much obliged if you would point them out to me.