2012 catches

The 2012 storm petrel season is underway, and off to a cracking start with 75 birds caught by team 1, including two previously ringed in the UK! Team 2 caught another 144 stormies, including two more UK-ringed birds and one Danish-ringed (presumably from the Faroe Islands). Team 3 caught 84 stormies, including 1 Spanish ringed, 2 more UK ringed and a night of 33 -the biggest single-night catch since 2009.

Team 1
June 5th-6th: 8 stormies, 1 UK-ringed control
June 7th-8th: 28 stormies
June 8th-9th: 13 stormies
June 10th-11th: 8 stormies, 1 UK ring
June 11th-12th: 18 stormies

Team 2
June 14-15th: 24 stormies, 1 UK ring
June 15-16th: 28 stormies, 1 Danish ring
June 16-17th: 19 stormies
June 18-19th: 27 stormies
June 19-20th: 26 stormies, 1 UK ring and a classic vomit sample containing 5 isopods!
June 20-21st: 20 stormies, and RAIN! The nets were shut for two periods before 4am, when catching had to end completely.

Team 3Team 3
June 23-24th: 18 stormies
June 24-25th: 18 stormies
June 25-26th: 11 stormies, 1 Spanish ring
June 27-28th: 17 stormies, Cory's shearwater over the nets!
June 28-29th: a fantastic 33 stormies, 1 UK ring PLUS, 1 Cory's shearwater!!!!!
June 29-30th: 5 stormies, 1 UK ring

Team 4 (for one night only!)
July 5-6th: 1 stormie
End of season barbecue!
Grand total for 2012: 322 stormies, 6 UK rings, 1 Danish ring, 1 Spanish ring, and a Cory's shearwater.

Hot news for this month is the acceptance for publication of Renata's latest PhD paper:
Renata Medeiros et al. Molecular evidence for gender differences in the migratory behaviour of a small seabird. PLoS One

...and another of our research group's papers is published this month:
Louise Soanes, Rob Thomas & Mark Bolton. 2012. Evaluation of field and analytical methods for estimating the population size of burrow-nesting seabirds from playback surveys. Bird Study, iFirst 2012 1-5.

First bird out of the net in 2012, wearing a British ring -what a start!