You have found a ringed bird with the label 'Vogelwarte Hiddensee' or 'Hiddensee Germania'? Or could you read a ring (neck collars of goose/swans; color-codes of gulls) of a free-living bird?
Please inform the ringing station!
Every person who reports ring numbers gets automatically information about the origin of the found ring (species, date and place of ringing, travalled distance, age of the bird).
Please provide following informations about your finding/ sighting (if known):
- entire label on the ring (ring number, ringing station)
- species
- location (community, county, state)
- date of finding
- circumstances of the finding (Is the bird dead or alive/injured? How did he died? How long is he dead? etc.)
If you want to send in a ring, please glue it with transparent tape on paper of hard graduation. Loose rings push through the envelope and get lost. You can also report rings of foreign ringing stations to the adress above.
More than 100 years birds were marked with lightweight aluminium rings to gain informations about migration, philopatric behaviour and their age. For this purpose the assistance of the public is needed: only if the ringing station receive ring sightings informations about these topics can be gained. Besides the research of migration the focus today is on population biology questions, e.g.:
- How old become birds?
- How many offspring are they rear during their lifetime?
- Are birds loyal to their partners? If so, how long?
- Are the philopatric?
- In which distance of their place of birth young birds settle down?
- How differ survival rates between different ages, migrating populations?
The ringing station Hiddensee is responsible for the ringing in the eastern states of Germany. It managed all data, which is associated with ringing of birds. It provides volunteer and professional bird ringer with rings and save data of the usage of these rings as well as all sightings.
The results of the ringing in Germany are published regularly:
Berichte der Vogelwarte Hiddensee
Die Vogelwarte (magazine of the Vogelwarte Helgoland and Radolfzell)