Pittswood Birds

It was still blowing a gale this afternoon, making it difficult to find much in the way of birds, but I persevered and had a wander over to the lakes, there just might be a different species on the water and so set a new January record, alas, I found only MALLARDS, MOORHENS and a CORMORANT, where's that feral Barnacle Goose when I need it!

I searched through the Wet Woods, hoping to find a Lesser Spotted Woodpecker or a Firecrest, but I was really clutching at straws now! I did stumble across a party of busy LONG TAILED TITS whilst there though, with them were a few BLUE and GREAT TITS, plus 2 GOLDCRESTS, I may of heard a Treecreeper call, but with the noise of the wind I wasn't sure. I found myself some shelter out of the wind, where I then heard one of the Great Tits give its spring call, and a MISTLE THRUSH sang from nearby, the sun peeped out from behind a cloud making it seem springlike for a few moments  :-)

My next best chance of adding a new species for the January list was hoping to find a Grey Wagtail over at the Greenhouse Grounds, I found two PIED WAGTAILS, but not the Grey unfortunately, GREEN and GREAT SPOTTED WOODPECKERS were also seen, along with a couple of BULLFINCH, but nothing more exciting than that.

A brief sky watch was had from my seat in a last gasp attempt at finding that one new species needed, but the wished for Golden plover or Brambling, both of which were possible candidates, didn't show up today  :-( In fact all I saw were a loose flock of HERRING and BLACK HEADED GULLS.

So the month ends on 68 species, 3 better than the mean average for the last 5 years, and as I said on a previous post its the joint best January tally. The combined 12 year January list was incremented by one this year, that was thanks to the Gadwall, that list stands at 84 species now.

I was back at the Garden feeders later this afternoon, but not much came in, I think the wind spooks the birds, however it was fun to see 11 Long Tailed Tits on the fat feeder, one of which did pose for a photo  :-)

Long Tailed Tit

Long Tailed Tit

Here's a few 'Tit' images from yesterdays efforts -

Great Tit

Great Tit

Great tit

Blue Tit

Blue Tit