ISLE OF MAN ORNITHOLOGICAL VISIT August, 1965 Last summer holidays Mr. Craine took a party of boys to the Isle of Man for a fortnight. The party consisted of G. M. Barton, N. C. P. Marsden, M. A. Groundwater, A. J. Moss, L. N. Thomson and J. R. Young. For the first six days we stayed at the Calf of Man Bird Observatory, where we trapped and ringed birds. The birds were caught in "Mist nets" and "Heligoland traps", taken back to the farmhouse where we were staying, ringed, weighed and measured, and finally set free. During our stay we caught and ringed over a hundred birds including a kestrel, a tree pipit, a garden warbler and many young migrating swallows. The latter part of the holiday was spent on Langness, camping, which was most enjoyable. Langness is a southerly peninsula on the Isle of Man, and is suitable as feeding grounds for waders, and also has thick banks of gorse which provide cover for passerines. We set up some large, sixty foot wader nets along the seashore here. In these we caught many waders including Dunlin, Ringed Plover, Redshank and a curlew. We also put up some mist nets, around the camp site, to try to catch some passerines; in this we were most successful catching Whinchats, Stonechat, Skylark, Meadow Pipit and a Spotted Flycatcher. We were visited by a Short-eared Owl several mornings, which swooped on small birds caught in the net, seven times, but unfortunately it did not get itself caught. Some days we went trapping birds in mist nets along the banks of the River Silverburn, where we caught several blue-tits which flew into the net in family parties of six or seven at a time. Here we also caught Robins, Goldfinch, Grey Wagtail, Tree Sparrow, Tree Creeper, Great Tit and House Martin. We saw huge flocks of Curlew on Langness, and this was also a favourite place for Herons to go fishing, there were twelve at one time. During our stay on the Isle of Man we also saw a Bar-tailed Godwit and an Arctic Skua, with several members of the Tern family. We had a most successful week on Langness, ringing 272 birds of 33 species. Fortunately the weather was gloriously hot and everyone had a marvellous time, thanks to Mr. Craine and the hospitality of his family. G.M.B.
YOUNG FARMERS' CLUB This term one meeting and three visits took place. At our first meeting, on the 6th of April, Mr. E. S. Hart, Head of the Agricultural Safety Division of the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents, gave a talk, illustrated by some particularly gruesome films, on farm safety. His talk mainly dealt with machinery and the people who were in charge of machines, and he stressed very much the importance of the farm labourer's acquaintance with machinery. The first visit of the term was to Southburn Estates, where Mr. D. Wells showed a party of sixteen members around the buildings and land. One of the most interesting features of the visit was the self-feed "haylage" system which had been installed in the buildings for winter feeding. 35
