Rob Lewis photographed a colour-ringed Curlew on 17 July 2021 at Angle Bay, Pembrokeshire.

This would be reported as: “Black ring with 24 in white, reading up on right tibia, metal ring on right tarsus: unengraved orange ring on left tibia, no rings on left tarsus”.  Note that 24 might easily have  been mistaken for Z4; but Z is never used in approved colour-ringing schemes, precisely to avoid this confusion. Similarly B and D are not used (to avoid confusion with 8 and 0). Even so, great care is needed in ring reading!

The ringer, Paddy Jenks, comments: “It was ringed as an adult male at the Gann estuary, Dale, Pembrokeshire, on 14 October 2018. Since then it has only been seen twice, both times in Angle Bay in December 2018 and then 8 October 2019. It’s really good to get another sighting as it helps with our study, a major part of which aims to monitor survival. There also seems to be a huge degree of site fidelity outside of the breeding season, but there are probably seasonal movements within this period too.”

So repeat sightings of the same birds at the same place all add to the picture.