Winter ringing of raptors near Kyiv
Raptor ringing is one of our studies directions
A trip to Kyiv area turned out to be rather interesting. After Christmas holidays I was enthusiastic to spend a day in nature and be revived with good impressions. Since the very dawn of 9.01.2009 I set tackles for catching raptors near the village of Pukhovka (Brovary district). Snow cover was thick, and temperature equaled to – 9˚С. Pigeons began to circle over a cattle-breeding farm, attracting hungry goshawks…
First I captured an adult female already with a ring on her leg. I took out my old acquaintance from the net and tightly swaddled the bird to lie and not to disturb me in making counts and catching other raptors. An attack of a Buzzard was unsuccessful; the bird only touched a decoy pigeon, but did not get into nets. However, other two attacks were lucky. I managed to catch an adult male and female. Each of the Buzzards got an aluminum ring and was released. After finishing observations the Goshawk female was also released. Apart from her, an adult male flew to hunt for pigeons, probably it was her partner.
Having returned home, I looked through ringing reports and was pleasantly surprised. I have found out that I had ringed this female on 16.10.1998. At that time she was already in an adult bird plumage. So, the bird’s age is at least 11 years!!! A really pleasant meeting for me! Today I also met a pair of adult White-tailed Eagles, about 15 Buzzards moving southward, a Rough-legged Buzzard and a Sparrowhawk.
Sergey Domashevsky