David with an Arctic Tern (handed under licence)

Wednesday 28th July comments: The summer months on the Isle of May are busy for everything and everyone involved with the island. From the boat operators to the island staff, its full on and often relentless (but in a nice way).

The NatureScot staff study and monitor the breeding Terns on the island collecting data from number of nesting pairs, productivity (how well or badly they are doing) and plenty of ringing. However some of the work we do on the Terns involves the bigger team, and our friends from UKCEH helped us catch and ring adult Arctic Terns which allows us to build a picture of turnover of birds and if we are recruiting from other colonies.

Last week one of our sessions produced a capture of an impressive 37 adults and many were unringed. However 11 birds were ringed and we are now finding out about their history and it's producing some really interesting results. Of these eleven, at least seven are from the Farne Islands and guess what… one was ringed on the Farnes as a chick in July 2013 by our current reserve manager David Steel (who previously worked and lived on the Farnes).

So it was a case of meeting an old friend, but both now on a different island. These results show the interchange between colonies and the importance of these tern colonies nationally, as you always have to look at the wider picture.