Pittswood Birds

Dense fog covered the area this morning, it didn't lift until gone 10:00hrs, so little was noted on my patch visit, very frustrating!!

A view into the scrubby woods as the fog starts to lift

It was in the above woods that I had hoped for a singing Willow Warbler, but again had to make do with the regulars of GOLDCREST, COAL TIT, GREAT TIT, CHIFFCHAFF, BLACKCAP, BLACKBIRD, SONGTHRUSH, WREN, DUNNOCK and ROBIN, whose singing was nowhere near as exuberant as yesterday morning. BULLFINCH and GREAT SPOTTED WOODPECKER called, plus a pair of LONG TAILED TITS were seen nest building, as I left a MISTLETHRUSH started to sing, not heard one singing for a week or so.

I presumed the the GREYLAG and CANADA GEESE were still on their nests, the fog restricted any views to just 20 meters over the lakes, however the MUTE SWAN pair were still visible  :-)

A pointless walk across the fields was undertaken, pointless as I couldn't see anything, but the exercise did me good! I headed off home for a cup of tea, and waited for the fog to lift, which it eventually did, but by then I had little time left, so spent an hour around the Greenhouse Grounds chasing Butterflies in the short lived sunny spell that was had. I heard a couple of MEADOW PIPITS flyover as I did so, and watched 4 LESSER BLACK BACKED GULLS drop down briefly onto the adjacent sheep pasture, joining 2 HERRING GULLS and 4 BLACK HEADED GULLS that were there. A short sky watch didn't provide me with a single raptor species or the anticipated first Swallow of the year  :-(

At least I got some Butterfly images!

Peacock Butterfly

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This orange Tip was my first female one this year

I took lots of photo's of it!!

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