Pittswood Birds

The ninety minutes I spent out on my patch this afternoon was quite a useful visit, I went over to the Lakes in some gloomy conditions ( yes back to the gloom again!) via the Small Holding, where the gang of GREEN WOODPECKERS that reside there were joined by 6 REDWING today, a bonfire had been lit in the Wet Woods, not sure whats happening there, so I went straight to the lakes. A KINGFISHER was seen briefly here, and the MALLARDS had increased from 2 birds to 12, the most seen here for months, with them were the usual scattering of MOORHENS.

In the adjacent Scrubby Woods I came across the LONG TAILED TIT flock that I saw yesterday morning, it had 2 GOLDCRESTS and a TREECREEPER with it, as well as small numbers of both BLUE and GREAT TIT, at least 3 BULLFINCH were heard to call too.

I left the lakes quite quickly, in order to get over to the Tree Nursery and Pub field before dusk fell, and as I came out of the Wet Woods I saw 3 STOCK DOVES (62) drop into a large Oak in a nearby garden - good to get them on the November list at last!

I reached the Pub Field expecting the usual, but today, as well as the WOODPIGEONS, there were at least 50 ROOKS, 4 MISTLETHRUSH and a solitary LAPWING (63) the first this month   :-) On to the Tree Nursery and the best on offer here were a flock of 8 GOLDFINCH, the long staying pair of MEADOW PIPITS and more Green Woodpeckers. As I stood watching the sky, I followed a flock of a dozen Redwing going over, when they suddenly dropped dramatically into the cover of a tree, I looked around and found the reason, of course, a SPARROWHAWK!  The KESTREL pair were watched for a few minutes, and small numbers of FIELDFARES were seen moving around the area, but dusk soon drew down so I headed off home, a good visit though :-)

Once home I had a scan of the garden feeders from my study window, then noticed a movement in my small holly tree, no not a Waxwing  :-)  but a Mistlethrush a real scarce bird in my garden, this is just the third in 12 years, the last was in April 2008, the Garden Species list moves on to 35 for this year now.  I took some photo's of it through the double glazing, and with the camera on ISO 2500 they were surprisingly reasonable, despite the near dark conditions!

Mistlethrush

This photo, and the one below were taken with the exposure compensation set to  minus'1' rather than '0', but it just made things worse I think, sometimes it pays to experiment though  :-)

Mistlethrush

This Mistlethrush may well of been the same one, I took this photo yesterday afternoon, it was in the tall tree in my neighbors garden