No prizes for guessing this award went to our second Penduline Tit! But there were also some other decent birds during the period.
We got our fair share of interesting birds during peak migration season, despite unusually warm and stormy conditions, including a record count for one species.
In 2022 we ringed just under 3,000 birds, well down on our long term average but better than the previous two Covid-impacted years. There were however some records set!
For the second year in a row, we've hosted large flocks of flightless ducks in moult. Not quite a record number, but we had record counts of two species - which ones were they?
Avian Flu hit our gull colony, but wildfowl were present in good numbers. But our most unexpected bird of the period was a species not recorded here since 1998!
Some outstanding birds graced the Spring migration this year. Which species became our 230th and 231st recorded at Rye Meads?
It may have been a quiet time of the year, but there was still enough to interest a keen birder! Not least the tiniest of our woodpeckers, which although caught didn't make our ringing list - find out why...
We already know from BTO recoveries that wintering Green Sandpipers in the UK normally breed in Scandinavia, but now we have more specific news of where one of the Rye Meads wintering birds goes to breed. It's even been photographed there!
Bearded Tits are irregular winter visitors to Rye Meads. Where do they come from and why are they only occasional in winter?
An Arctic spell interrupted unseasonably mild weather. How did this affect our birds? We still had some interesting sightings!