Pittswood Birds

Midsummers day, but not midsummers weather unfortunately,  this morning was dull, damp and heavily overcast, with very poor visibility again.

I made a trip around the bean fields, hedgerows and ditches on the new part of my patch first thing, it's noticeable in this area that there are more WHITETHROAT territories than on other parts of my patch, also there is at least one YELLOWHAMMER territory, and one was seen carrying food into a large dense hedgrow. A party of LONG TAILED TITS moved along one of the ditches, using the mature willow trees for cover, and further along the same ditch a family of TREECREEPERS were seen in a mature Oak.

Spits of rain were blowing in the breeze as I made my way over to Migrant Alley, where I took my seat for a sky watch, a KESTREL sat on the Greenhouse roof behind me, and it didn't take long for a SPARROWHAWK to wheel its way over. Not much else was noted in the sky though, a few SWIFTS and SWALLLOWS and 2 LESSER BLACK BACKED GULLS with 4 HERRING GULLS which made there way over to the ripped up paddock.

A check of the Ashes lane field was had, where 4 STOCK DOVES were feeding on the emerging seedling grasses, the adjacent Pub Field had a few WOODPIGEON and JACKDAWS amongst the maize crop, I had hoped for a Lapwing, not all that likely, but they have turned up in this habitat in June before.

I didn't have time for a full patch visit, but all being well, that should be possible tomorrow, hopefully I can find something for the months list, which has ground to a halt! Later in the afternoon the sun eventually made a short appearance, and it brightened my mostly shaded garden up just enough to take a few photo's of the juvenile birds visiting  :-)

Juv. GREAT SPOTTED WOODPECKER

Juv. Great Spotted Woodpecker

Juv. Great Spotted Woodpecker

Immature GREENFINCH

This CHAFFINCH looks to be a young bird, but maybe an adult female

Not much sign of a 'gape' on it, but it's plumage is very washed out

Immature BLUE TIT, getting its blue wings already  :-)