Pittswood Birds

It was 08:00hrs before the rain stopped this morning, after which, a strong wind soon picked up, blowing in some heavy rain and hail showers, thus making for another very difficult patch walk.

Much of the bird life stayed out of the wind and out of sight, my walk around the lakes and Scrubby Woods was therefore very unproductive. I could just hear a pair of GOLDCREST singing, but the MISTLETHRUSH, a lover it seems of such stormy conditions, was much easier to hear.

Little was on the 3 lakes, just the COOT and MUTE SWAN pair, plus the regular MALLARD and MOORHENS, which is default mode for this year  :-)

I soon made my way out onto the Fields, but again the wind made things very difficult, the most noteworthy birds were a group of 20 or so Gulls which sat out on the pasture at Migrant Alley, all were HERRING GULLS apart from two, which were LESSER BLACK BACKED GULLS, a flock of 15-20 BLACK HEADED GULLS flew over low, but didn't join the grounded Gulls.

It was possible to hear a SKYLARK singing over the rougher parts of the Ashes Lane Field, it looks good for them to breed on there, it being not grazed, however, all will depend on when the field is cut. Skylarks have not bred on my patch since 2009, although they do attempt to, the land management here is not conducive to ground nesting birds  :-(

Anyway, another patch visit degraded by the uncompromising weather, we really need a break from it now!

Still a few photo's from my garden left in the ''blog folder'' these Great Spotted Woodpecker images were taken yesterday.

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