Pittswood Birds

A dark and gloomy sky over Pittswood

A LESSER REDPOLL (41) was calling from the top of the Silver Birch tree in a neighbours garden as I left for work this morning, but a thick fog had developed, and the walk in was hopeless for birding, except for the sound of MEADOW PIPITS (42) as I walked across Migrant Alley. The walk home again was only notable for the BULLFINCH (43) that was heard calling from the hedgerow along Ashes Lane.

Nothing at all was at the garden feeders, which I watched as I ate my lunch, I suspect the Sparrowhawk was hiding nearby  :-) I then set off for a little under 2 hours, visiting the Small Holding, Wet Woods, and Lake / Scrubby Woods area. In the small holding three GREEN and a GREAT SPOTTED WOODPECKER were in the old orchard, a JAY flew out and across into the Wet Woods, followed by two REDWING which alighted in an old dying pear tree, nice to see them stopping by at last! Four CHAFFINCH fed on the seeds of the old pears, but I couldn't stretch one into a Brambling :-)

Through the Wet Woods, all was quiet apart from the high pitch trembling call of a TREECREEPER (44) another species for the November list. I spent an hour mooching around the Lakes and Scrubby Woods, but it was not very inspiring, I at least saw my first PHEASANT (45) for the month :-)  The call of a TAWNY OWL (46) from the dense cover of a line of leylandi was a nice surprise though, however, the search for my first Goldcrest and Songthrush for November will have to resume tomorrow, where have they all disappeared ? Normally they are on the list from day one!

I walked home through the Tree Nursery, where 7 Meadow Pipits flew up and circled back round again, plus a couple of LINNETS (47) were found drinking from a large puddle. I had run out of light for a Migrant Alley visit, and it was only quarter past four !  :-(  I'll settle for the 7 new species for the month though, and I can think of 5 more species that should be found easily this month, so the 50 mark will be passed, but the record of 68 looks a long way off !

Chaffinch from the Small Holding - as you can see photography is a struggle now in the poor light !

This little blue fungus looked interesting, thought I saw Dean post a photo one of these on his blog, was it called a Bluet....or something  ?