Visitors from up-country

We recently received details from the BTO of a nesting Barn Owl we recaught in on of our boxes at the end of May. We mostly catch our own birds, ringed as adults or chicks, but just occasionally we welcome a visitor to Cornwall. GR53474 is now breeding in a box near Fraddam, but had been ringed in 2017 as a chick at Irlam in Greater Manchester, over 420km to the north!

Since we've been monitoring Barn Owls in the county, the only other long-distance visitor we've recaugt was a bird ringed as a chick in Suffolk in 2017 that was breeding in Newbridge the next year (see here). Apart from that, a bird ringed as a chick in Cumbria in 1990 was found dead near Golant in its first winter and incredibly we have also had birds ringed in Germany an The Netherlands found here.



The same day the Irlam Barn Owl was caught we were also able to catch up with another visitor from the north (the second line on the map above). Red AXF was ringed as an adult on Puffin Island off Anglesey in summer 2016 but since then has found Cornwall to its liking, breeding ever since at Western Cove, Portreath.