Our first foreign recovery!! BHG - 2AAR

I received an email at the end of last week from the Polish Bird Ringing Centre, which was entitled, "2AAR".

With great excitement I opened the attached file which told me that this bird had been re-sighted on 11 April by Michal Polakowski at Hryniewicze-wysypisko smieci, Podlaskie in eastern Poland!

2AAR was one of seven birds caught and ringed on 21 December at Antrim, and it has been recorded there throughout the winter.  It was last seen on 12 March by Keith Stevens, which means it has travelled the 1,911km (1194 miles) to Poland in under a month....and that's if it flew in a straight line.

Red - Lough Neagh, Co. Antrim, NI
Blue - Podlaskie, Poland

2AAR shortly after being ringed, 21.12.12

2AAR at Antrim in January 2013

This is hopefully the first of many re-sightings we will get of our project birds and to get a result like this so early in the project is extremely encouraging, especially as, in the grand scheme of things, we've colour-ringed relatively few birds.

Thanks to Michal for reporting his sighting and to the Polish Bird Ringing Centre for getting in contact.