Pittswood Birds

This morning was cool and windy, the heavy cloud cover continually threatened rain, but very little actually fell.

There was nothing much to note on the sheep pasture and paddocks of Migrant Alley first thing, just a few MEADOW PIPITS and a small flock of around 25 STARLINGS, the GREY WAGTAIL was at the nearby Greenhouse Grounds, soon taking flight as the work crew arrived with their brush cutters, not much left there to cut now!

A CHIFFCHAFF called from the Pub Field hedgerow, and a KESTREL was hunting at the adjacent Ashes lane Fields, over which thousands of leaves from the trees in the Wet Woods blew across on the gusty wind, all very Autumnal now.

Another Chiffchaff was heard at the Scrubby Woods where COAL TIT, BULLFINCH, GOLDCREST, NUTHATCH, and JAY were all heard. I watched a party of 15 - 20 HOUSE MARTINS flying past on the wind, not looking unlike the leaves that I saw blowing across the sky earlier, it was as I watched them that I saw a LITTLE EGRET (55) fly over, a good species for the October list!

A KINGFISHER was the only bird of note at the lakes, where the MUTE SWAN family, lone COOT, 6 MALLARDS and at least 8 MOORHENS were as usual present.

My end of walk sky watch from my seat at Migrant Alley had some bits of interest, mainly the passage of House Martins, many groups of 12 -15 birds were blown through on the wind, but just one SWALLOW was noted with them. BLACK HEADED and HERRING GULLS also flew past, I also picked out a LESSER BLACK BACKED GULL (56) for the months list, the call of a REED BUNTING was heard, but views of it were brief as it flew SE, the only other species of note seen were a single CORMORANT, plus the obligatory SPARROWHAWK.

Not a bad visit, with two more species added to the months list, which will hopefully be incremented by some Geese soon, plus a Grey Heron should turn up within the next few days, or maybe the eagerly anticipated ''chack chack'' call of a Fieldfare will be heard   :-)

Just one image left in my ''blog photo folder'' now, that's of the WREN that visited my garden yesterday  ..........

Garden Wren