Pittswood Birds

Apologies for the lack of a post yesterday, there was a fault on the telephone line and I lost my broadband, things are just not going my my this month!!  I didn't get out yesterday afternoon as I was checking my home wiring, thinking the problem was in my home, but eventually contacted BT through a mind boggling automated phone system and got the fault reported, fair play to them though, in less than 24 hours they had the line repaired. :-)

Back to today, and I was off work, not feeling to good, and most of my birding was done from the house, but a short visit over to the Tree Nursery,  Pub Field and Migrant Alley was made around 11:00hrs. I didn't do the lakes as I could hear the chainsaws still chopping away in the garden next to them. I was only out for 90 mins, in some warm and sunny conditions, which makes for poor birding at this time of year, I cant remember a November with so few birds on my patch!  I did see 30+ LAPWING and 20+ BLACK HEADED GULLS on the Pub Field, a couple of MEADOW PIPITS in the Tree Nursery, and at Migrant Alley a YELLOWHAMMER was good to see, along with a GREY WAGTAIL that flew from the nearby Greenhouse Complex, flyovers from KESTREL and SPARROWHAWK were noted. However, my half hour skywatch didn't give me a fly over species that was new for the month, Mute Swan or Little Egret would have done  ;-)

So the month ends on 66 species, the joint second best tally for November, which is not too shabby considering the unseasonable weather, and some of the disturbance I have had here. The combined ten year November list now stands at 85, it was incremented by the Crossbill and Red Legged Partridge, which suggests that this month list could have been higher, but the average November total for the last 5 years is 64, so I cant be too disappointed  :-)

The afternoon garden watch was a bit better than of late, I didn't see any Sprawk attacks whilst I watched, which encouraged 17 species to come to the feeders, although there is a huge drop in numbers birds visiting, probably due to the mild weather, especially finch's, only a peak count of 4 GOLDFINCH, 2 GREENFINCH, and 4 CHAFFINCH were made, the visitors which did turn up in any numbers were the BLUE TITS, at least 20 were zipping in and out, with 3-4 GREAT TITS and a single COAL TIT.. Singles of JACKDAW, MAGPIE, BLACKBIRD, DUNNOCK, WREN, and GOLDCREST, were also seen, along with 2 GREAT SPOTTED WOODPECKERS, 2 NUTHATCH and 2 ROBINS. COLLARED DOVES and STARLINGS were the other two species to visit, both with a peak of 7 coming in.

Here's some of todays photo's  :-)

Yellowhammer at Migrant Alley

Yellowhammer again

One of the ever present Blue Tits from my garden

Garden Great Tit