Pittswood Birds

I managed a full patch walk for the last patch visit of November, the gloomy weather of recent days had lifted and there were some short sunny spells to be had during the 3 and a half hour walk.

I had hoped to add at least one new species to the November list, but in the end didn't even get anywhere near an average species tally for a Novembers day, an incredible low count of just 35 species were found this morning, with 10 of those being represented by just single birds, they were out of interest, COAL TIT, NUTHATCH, KINGFISHER, FIELDFARE, GREAT SPOTTED WOODPECKER, SONGTHRUSH, SKYLARK, MOORHEN, MEADOW PIPIT and PIED WAGTAIL - probably the worse full patch visit ever!

On the bright side the MUTE SWANS I saw fly in yesterday had indeed returned to the Ornamental Lake, that will be a good species to get on the December list  - if they stay  :-)  The best part of the visit was watching the increasing number of birds coming down to the seed I put out on the track at the Greenhouse Grounds, where at least 30 GOLDFINCH, 10 CHAFFINCH, 6 BLUE TIT 2 GREAT TIT, 4 SISKIN, a DUNNOCK, a ROBIN and a BLACKBIRD all fed, also a pair of BULLFINCH were seen nearby. Not even the Kestrels were about today!!

So after a bit of an anticlimax to the end of November, the month finished on 65 species, the 3rd best tally out of the twelve recorded, 65 species is bang on the average achieved for the previous five Novembers, so I cant complain there, but the overall numbers of birds has markedly decreased.

The combined 12 year November species total is now on 87 having been incremented by one with Mediterranean Gull, this is the third lowest, behind January and February, so that doesn't bode well for the new year! 

A poor post today, made worse by the fact i've run out of photo's to put up  :-(