How to report a ringed bird

Ringing of wild birds is for scientific purposes.
You can help science by sending us the finding details!

If you find or observe a bird with a metal ring or some other type of marking, please report the ring number to the Copenhagen Bird Ringing Centre (concerning readings of colour marks, however, see below).

You can either write to us at our postal address (see below) or send an e-mail, or phone us at +45 3532 1029, or fax us at +45 3532 1010 with the following information:

1. Ring number and name of ringing central
2. Species - if known or supposed
3. Date - and time of recovery
4. Place of recovery, with the name of the nearest well-known town, and district
5. Details about the recovery:

• Condition: Alive, dead (recently dead or dead for some time), found sick or wounded, etc.
• Circumstances: Traffic accident, collision with windows or wires, shot, poisoned, sick/wounded and put down, killed by any animal, caught and released, ring number read in the field, only ring found, etc.

6. Name of finder, with full postal address and phone number. All finders will receive a letter with the ringing details if we have your postal address (snail mail).

If the bird is dead, we would like you, if possible, to:

• take off the ring
• gently straighten teh ring as much you can
• tape it securely to a piece of cardboard
• please write the ring number in the accompanying letter (this is important because sometimes rings break through the envelope and are lost)
• write whether you have previously contacted the Copenhagen Bird Ringing Centre about this particular ring recovery
• send the ring together with information of the finding details (nos. 1-6) to the Copenhagen Bird Ringing Centre (our postal address is listed below)

Coloured plastic rings and other types of colour markings:

If you read a colour mark on a wild bird in the field without reading the metal ring number as well, please give your information directly to the co-ordinator of that particular colour-marking project. Lists and addresses of all European colour-marking projects are available on the (external) web site http://www.cr-birding.be/. However, if you cannot track down the correct colour-marking project, you are of course welcome to send your information to the Copenhagen Bird Ringing Centre, and we will pass it on.
 

Our postal address is:

Copenhagen Bird Ringing Centre
Zoological Museum
Universitetsparken 15
DK-2100 Copenhagen Ø
Denmark
Tel +45 3532 1029
Fax +45 3532 1010
E-mail ringing@snm.ku.dk
 

An example of a report
 

1.	Ring number	9.J18.765, Zool. Mus. Denmark
2.	Species	small greyish-brown bird, possibly Garden Warbler
3.	Date	23 April 1999, at c. 1600 hrs
4.	Place	Sønderskov, near the town of Hjørring, Jutland
5.	Details	found recently dead, had flown against window pane in winter garden of house we have rented for our vacation
6.	Name	Adam Schmidt, Vogelstrasse 78, D-17498 Neuenkirchen, Germany, tel. +49 9999 999 999.