Bird ringing

The Manx Ringing Group operate as part of the Manx BirdLife charity and under licence by the Manx Government’s Department of Environment, Food & Agriculture and its ringers hold a current permit issued by the British Trust for Ornithology.

Manx Shearwater - small numbers are caught by the Manx Ringing Group

Chris Sharpe is the Group Leader and Kev Scott is the group secretary. Sean Gray and Dave Sharpe are the other resident ringers and a small handful of regular visiting ringers ring on our behalf when they are on the Island.

The ringing group can be contacted via the Manx BirdLife offices at 35 New Road, Laxey IM4 7BG, on telephone (01624) 861130 or via the ringing group secretary, Kevin Scott at manxrg@gmail.com.

You can keep right up to date with the activities of the ringing group through Kevin’s ‘blog’ at www.manxringer.blogspot.com where information on recent ringing trips and recoveries are regularly posted.

Any ringers planning to visit the Island should contact us to sort out the details as a separate licence issued by the IOM Government is required to ring any birds on the Isle of Man.

Mute Swan with colour ring - one of several projects being undertaken by the Manx Ringing Group

The group do a varied range of ringing and we have colour ringing projects on Chough, large Gulls, Mute Swan, Cormorant, Rock Pipit & Twite. We also do Storm Petrel ringing, Wader/Tern ringing, several nest box studies and also general garden ringing.

The groups current colour ringing projects can be viewed here – Manx RG colour ringing projects.

An annual ringing report is published in “Peregrine”, the Manx Bird report. The reports are also available here:

Manx Chough pullus being ringed with BTO and colour rings

Projects include the ringing of pullus Choughs, using colour rings to enable birds to be individually identified after they have fledged.

Working with the RSPB, young Hen Harriers are also being ringed. The Isle of Man supports a healthy population of Hen Harriers, which can be seen on the hills, in the curraghs and the Ayres.

A project on Rock Pipits has also commenced, looking into dispersal and site fiedelity of the local and migrant populations of the Island.