Pittswood Birds

A pleasant breeze blew this morning, making it feel more pleasant in the sunny conditions than in previous days.

Very little is happening on the birding front, just 41 species were seen during the 5 hours I was out, many of those were only heard, or seen singly. The undoubted highlight of the visit was seeing a PEREGRINE fly over Migrant Alley, the two dozen SWALLOWS were caught off guard, and only started alarming after the Peregrine had almost gone through, luckily they weren't on the Peregrines menu this morning  :-)

Just one adult KESTREL was seen at the Greenhouse Complex, but i'm sure its young are about somewhere. The WHITETHROAT family were found there though, along with a CHIFFCHAFF, a BLACKCAP and a pair of BULLFINCH, I also heard a COAL TIT calling, unusual to get one at the Greenhouse Grounds.

As the morning wore on, it became hot again, and the birds became fewer, I walked through the Small Holding, Wet Woods, and Scrubby Woods, finding the likes of TREECREEPER, GREAT SPOTTED and GREEN WOODPECKER, and GOLDCREST. The COOT family were on the Ornamental Lake, with two MALLARD, on the main lake there were two GREYLAGS and 12 CANADA GEESE.

The Scrubby Woods was more notable for the Odonata I saw, which included 2 Beautiful Demoiselle, my first Banded Demoiselle of the year - a great record here, as well as Common Blue, Large Red, Red Eyed, and White-legged Damselfly, plus Brown Hawker, and Emperor Dragonfly, also a Common Darter was seen, a good haul for a patch of woodland  :-)

Male Linnet

I took lots of photo's of this scarce, patch visitor - as you can see!

Banded demoiselle. The light was very harsh by now

Banded Demoiselle

Banded Demoiselle

To round off an overall good patch visit this morning, I finally, after trying all week, got a decent Purple Hairstreak photo  :-)

Purple Hairstreak, sipping the last of the mornings dew

Purple Hairstreak