Pittswood Birds

No rain this morning, so it was an early start for the first full patch walk of the new month. I spent a little under 4 hours out, in mostly cloudy conditions where quite a good selection of species was recorded.

JACKDAW, ROBIN, STARLING, GOLDFINCH, BLUE TIT, WOODPIGEON, WREN, DUNNOCK, BLACKBIRD, PHEASANT, GOLDCREST and GREAT TIT were the first dozen species recorded for March, all were seen as I walked along Ashes Lane first thing. Crossing the Ashes lane Field, I saw the LITTLE OWL was at home in the old shack, and 4 REDWING flew over, as did a GREY HERON.  GREENFINCH, CHAFFINCH, and HOUSE SPARROW were seen in an adjacent garden, while the field itself only had MAGPIE and CARRION CROW on it.

Over on the lakes it was reasonably quiet, the MUTE SWAN and COOT pair continue their stay into March, but the only other visitors to join the MOORHENS and MALLARDS today were 3 CANADA GEESE.

Goldcrest

The Scrubby Woods gave me most of what I could reasonably expect, with GREEN and GREAT SPOTTED WOODPECKERS, LONG TAILED TIT, JAY, BULLFINCH, MISTLETHRUSH ( which was nest building) COAL TIT, SISKIN and TREECREEPER all being seen. The Wet Woods gave me more of the same, but I was surprised to see 10 MANDARIN DUCKS fly from high up an Oak tree, another 5 were on the pools of water, but they may have been part of the initial 10 seen.

Around the Fields and paddocks of Migrant Alley I found MEADOW PIPIT and SKYLARK, plus the ROOK flock, the only HERRING GULL flew over, followed by 15 BLACK HEADED GULLS.

Another Little Owl was seen in the Greenhouse Copse, while the Greenhouse Grounds provided a few more species for the new months list, those being PIED WAGTAIL, SONGTHRUSH, COLLARED DOVE and LINNET, whilst there, a flock of 35 FIELDFARE flew low over, and a little later 3 COMMON BUZZARDS circled low over the Greenhouses. The last and 47th species for the morning was a flyover STOCK DOVE, seen as I walked home along Ashes Lane.

Later in the morning, my friend reported a REED BUNTING that he had found whilst out over at the Greenhouse Grounds, thanks for that Grant, a good species for my patch, just wish I had found it!!

I had an hour back out early this afternoon, but only added GREYLAG GOOSE to the March list, 5 of which flew over Migrant Alley. My garden feeders chipped in with a couple of species that were missed while on my morning walk, those being a NUTHATCH and the male REDPOLL

So the March list kicks off with 51 species, a brilliant total for the first day of the month  :-) Still a long way to go to get anywhere near the March record tally of 71 though, that was achieved in 2010, the mean average tally for the last 5 March's is 68, still a hard task to get to that!

More pics from the garden  :-)

House Sparrow

Starling

Yet more Siskin - at least 8 were at my feeders today

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