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| Starling On the Suet Block, Back At Home |
Today was another day where someone forgot to turn the lights on!! A dense cloud cover persisted all day, but at least it stayed dry for my three and a half hour patch visit this morning, which provided me with 42 species, still a bit low for a November day.
Right from the off it was again evident that WOODPIGEONS were on the move, many hundreds headed south in flocks of 70-100, in fact good proportion of todays sightings were flyovers, with GREY HERON, PIED WAGTAIL, LINNET, REDPOLL, SKYLARK, LESSER BLACK BACKED, HERRING and BLACK HEADED GULL, MISTLE THRUSH, KESTREL, and 4 CORMORANTS, (another was also on the main lake fishing) all seen going over, the best flyover however, was of two flocks of LAPWING (54) one of 8 and one of 14, always good to see them, better if they were on one of the fields though :-)
There were many more FIELDFARE about today, with several small flocks seen in various places on my patch, these no doubt fresh arrivals, coming in on the stiff NW breeze, not one Redwing was seen today though. Other sightings of note were the farmland species at Migrant Alley, which again included 6 YELLOWHAMMER, and 8 MEADOW PIPIT, while BULLFINCH, TREECREEPER, GOLDCREST, SISKIN, GREAT SPOTTED WOODPECKER and a SPARROWHAWK were seen at the more wooded end of my patch, the Sprawk was shown to me by 3 MAGPIES, who noisily mobbed it in a tall oak :-)
This afternoon I ordered myself a large bag of wheat............I'm going to spread it in the bottoms of the hedgerows at Migrant Alley, and around the scrubby area at the Greenhouse Complex to try and attract a few birds in, mainly Yellowhammers, but who knows what may turn up, hmmmm....probably Pheasants!!
8 comments:
Not the brightest of days was it! Perhaps you might tempt in a Little Bunting, just remember to let me know please.
Good idea about the wheat, you never know what you might get :)
Nice shot of the Starling Warren, we're just starting to get Starlings back in our garden after a long break from feeding them!
Marc, Sharon,
I hope it's worth the 18 quid I paid for the wheat :-) A flock of Yellowhammers 25+ should repay me :-)
That sounds like it could be an expensive way of feeding the local pheasants. Costs us almost as much as they eat devising and building contraptions to keep the off the feeding station at the reserve
Good luck - 25+ Yellowhammers WOULD be nice and just reward for your 'pocket money'
Cheers
D
18 quid!!!! I got a bag for nowt off the farmer where we stable the horses.
On the farmland alongside my reserve we have large feeder bins that the farm fill full of corn for the pheasants to feed at, as I go by in the early morning I "borrow" a sackful from there.
You need to be mindful that the corn will also attract rats at this time of the year, which the landowner might not be grateful for.
With the price of Wheat as it is now Warren, you might find me scrabbling around under the hedgerow!!
Probably pheasants alright! I bet some of those Woodpigeons will be plundering that seed too! Still, worth it if you get a yellowhammer.
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