Beautiful catches

This morning Alvin and I started the day quite tired and slow while opening the nets. Luckily the morning had a lot of gorgeous surprises for us to give us energy!

In the early hours we started with a very well behaved Starling (Stær) male, who was kind enough to not scream and be agitated in the hand as this species usually is.

Beautiful male starling, very calm and well behaved!

The day progressed and in between rounds we had a little bit of time to look for moths that we might have caught during the night with our moth trap, and we kept on discovering more and more beautiful moths! This was one of the most exciting moth traps sessions we both have had so far!

Some highlights are the Small Elephant Hawk-Moth (Deilephila porcellus), Light Emerald (Campaea margaritaria), Fox Moth (Macrothylacia rubi), Angle Shade (Phlogophora meticulosa), White Ermine (Spilosoma lubricipeda).

Small Elephant Hawk-Moth (Deilephila porcellus)

Small Elephant Hawk-Moth (Deilephila porcellus) on the left and Light Emerald (Campaea margaritaria) on the right

Fox Moth (Macrothylacia rubi) on the left, Small Elephant Hawk-Moth (Deilephila porcellus) in the middle, Angle Shade (Phlogophora meticulosa) on the right

White Ermine (Spilosoma lubricipeda)

The very next round we were even more spoiled and captured a very cute Redpoll pair, caught together and who were calling to each other the whole time. They were a breeding pair as the female showed an extensive brood patch and the male a cloacal protrusion. We released them together and they flew off back to their duties together.

Pair of Lesser Redpolls, male on the left and female on the right.

In the next nets, while I was busy extracting the redpolls, I heard Alvin shout of excitement so I was so curious to see what he had found in the nets! It was a beautiful Crested Tit (Topmejse), a recapture ringed last summer as a juvenile bird. This is a new species for the year 2026 here! And it was also a new species for both Alvin and I.

Recapture Crested Tit

And it’s not over! In the next net we found the first Reed Warbler (Rørsanger) of the season as well!

Reed Warbler

Overall a very nice morning which brought us excellent birds and moths, we had such a lovely time!