Pittswood Birds

Another 5 hour full patch walk this morning turned up slightly fewer bird species, 46 in all, the likes of Skylark, Pheasant, Coal Tit, Sparrowhawk, and one or two others seen yesterday were missed today. On the other hand, I had GREY HERON, of which two flew over Migrant alley early on, and another was on the main lake, plus a LESSER WHITETHROAT that was seen in the Tree Nursery, neither were recorded yesterday.

Much of the mornings activity mirrored yesterdays, but a notable flock of GREYLAG and CANADA GEESE flew over the Wet Woods around 8:00am, I watched them take to the air from the recently cut Rape field just off my patch, from my vantage point at Migrant Alley I counted a minimum of 200 Greylags and 70 Canada's, amazing to watch.

The berry bearing shrub at the Scrubby Woods was again hosting at least 5 BLACKCAPS, and the GARDEN WARBLER. Amazingly, after seeing my first Garden warbler of the year yesterday, a second bird was seen feeding with a mixed Tit flock in the Wet Woods, it was high up in the canopy, the first time ive seen one with a Tit flock.

With the long sunny spells this morning, the other wildlife came into there own, with 14 Butterfly species being seen, most of these were feeding on a large Budlea bush in the Scrubby Woods, 7-10 Red Admirals, 2 Peacocks, 2 Commas, lots of Gatekeepers and a few Large and Small Whites made for a great sight.

Also this morning my first sighting of some Odenata species for what seems like weeks, Brown Hawker, Common Darter and White legged Damselfly were seen.

I took a real mix of photo's today, here's a few :-

Above: A GREEN WOODPECKER, feeding on the floor of the Scrubby Wood

Above: One of the WHITETHROATS at the Tree Nursery, I located the family of 6 that fledged there a week ago.

This Fox was enjoying the early morning sunshine, just look at the contentment on it's face!

Three of the Butterflies are below, first the Peacock, the a Gatekeeper, and lastly a Red Admiral

Above is a Common Darter and below is the White legged Damselfly