Pittswood Birds

It was still on the gloomy side this morning, but it brightened up as the morning went on, quite a nice day in fact for early January  :-)

I didn't do a full patch walk today, I missed out the College Grounds as all the groundsman are back to work there now and its too disturbed by the time I get over there . Instead I concentrated on the Small Holding, Lakes, Scrubby Woods, Wet Woods, Tree Nursery and Greenhouse Grounds.

40 species were recorded, nothing too much out of the ordinary though, but I'm still managing to keep the year/Months list ticking over with the likes of GREYLAG GOOSE (52) , nine of which flew over the Tree Nursery early on in the visit. The first PHEASANT (53) of the year was seen in the Small Holding, where a LITTLE OWL was also heard calling. The adjacent Wet Woods had a decent mixed feeding flock, most of which were LONG TAILED TITS, but COAL TIT, MARSH TIT, BLUE and GREAT TIT were also seen with them, plus a NUTHATCH, a TREECREEPER and a GREAT SPOTTED WOODPECKER tagged along.

Over on the lakes today it was back to normal after yesterdays star bird, only a few MALLARDS and MOORHEN remain, plus the COOT. In the nearby Scrubby Woods BULLFINCH'S made themselves obvious with there calls, and at least 5 were seen.

Walking back over to the Tree Nursery to get to the Greenhouse Grounds, a COMMON BUZZARD (54) was seen hunting over the Wet Woods, and a few REDWING, FIELDFARE and STARLING were back on the Sheep pasture, but not in the numbers seen yesterday.  Over at the Tree Nursery it was pretty quite really, the KESTREL pair were seen, and a small number of BLACK HEADED and HERRING GULLS flew over, 4 SISKIN fed in the line of Alders, and 3 more Bullfinch were seen.

Once again this afternoon I had time to take some garden photo's in the better light conditions. I have recently seen some nice photo's on other kent blogs of birds posing on logs, so I set myself up a similar situation, my peanut filled log worked quite well, enticing down the likes of NUTHATCH and COAL TIT, as well as the MARSH TIT, but the latter was too quick today  :-) More pleasing was a fleeting chance to get a closer shot of the GREEN WOODPECKER, an unexpected bonus!

Nuthatch

Coal Tit

Great Tit

Green Woodpecker