Pittswood Birds

A considerably warmer afternoon was had today, helped by the fact there was very little wind, this helps when listening for bird calls. The first call was the shrill 'seeeee' of REDWINGS that were feeding on a patch of snow free grass at the small holding. With them were a flock of mixed finches, GOLD, GREEN and CHAFFINCH maybe around 15 - 20 in all, also a GREENWOODPECKER was feeding with them, above this lot was a flock of 6 LONG TAILED TITS, the first seen this month. Along to the wet woods, where all seemed quiet, I waited and listened, and heard some BLUE and GREAT TITS calling nearby, so I made my way over to them and sat and waited. It wasn't long before I was surrounded by a feeding flock, consisting of at least 5 GOLDCREST, the first TREECREEPER, of the month and a COAL TIT. Two GREAT SPOTTED WOODPECKERS were also nearby. Over at the lake, nothing was seen but frozen, snow covered water, but on the feeders in the nearby garden the MARSH TITS were snatching sunflower hearts, this species brings up the 50 for this month.
In the tree nursery, there was a work party, so nowt much was seen there, I went to check the Barn Owl roost but the workers were right next to it, so it wasn't at home. I decided on a quick walk round the maize stubbles at migrant alley to see if I could pick up a skylark for the months list, but failed, as the fields were still under snow, apart from a 10 meter wide strip that had recently been muck spreaded. There was a LAPWING out on the sheep pasture though and another new species for the month flew over - a KESTREL.

Above is one of the Goldcrests, I watched it struggle for some minutes with a moth it had found from somewhere!

Above is the Lapwing, and below is it flying off!

Here's a photo of the ''Tidied'' lake. You can see the other smaller lake behind the tree's, the other larger lake is to the left. You can see the car tracks in the snow, that's the drive from the large house, one reason nothing much shows up on this lake.