Pittswood Birds

I didn't do the full patch walk today, instead I went over to my seat at Migrant Alley and watched the sky for a couple of hours. I was confident in seeing my first Cormorant of the month, but it was mis placed confidence as none were seen!

In fact very little indeed was seen going over, certainly no migration movements, just the Gulls and Corvids mainly, heading for their own field of sheep pasture, quite a number of each built up, with over 300 HERRING GULLS and over 1000 Corvids!  Six LESSER BLACK BACKED GULLS were with the Herring Gulls, and just 4 BLACK HEADED GULLS, the corvids were comprised of ROOKS and JACKDAWS, split 60/40 in favour of ROOKS.

After two hours sky watching I walked the Pasture and Paddocks of Migrant Alley, and found a few warbler species, mainly in the Wooded Headland, where a mixed group of CHIFFCHAFF, WHITETHROAT, BLACKCAP and a single LESSER WHITETHROAT were seen. The hedgrow boundary with the Greenhouse Complex had more Blackcap, Chiffchaff and Whitethroat, but no sign of the Sedge Warbler today. A LITTLE OWL called from the Greenhouse Copse, and a YELLOW WAGTAIL was heard going over, but I couldn't see it.

Around 10:00hrs I went home for breakfast, before once again resuming my vigil from my seat, where another 3 hours were spent sky watching, in that time I found 4 Raptor species, SPARROWHAWK, KESTREL, COMMON BUZZARD and HOBBY, but not much in the way of passage Migrants, just lots of SWALLOWS, most of which were local birds, and the pleasing sight of four SKYLARKS dropping down amongst the sheep. When I left to go home I cut through the Greenhouse Grounds, where a WILLOW WARBLER was seen amongst the mobile home units that house the workers, this was the 44th species of the day, which is a really surprising total, as most of the patch wasn't covered.

Not a bad visit then, I had hoped for a Wheatear or maybe even a Whinchat on the paddocks, but it's proving to be a poor year for the passage of these passage species here.

Willow Warbler at the Greenhouse Grounds

Willow Warbler

This Chiffchaff visited my garden, it flitted around the Buddleia and hollyhocks while I had a late breakfast

Chiffchaff on Hollyhock

Chiffchaff