Pittswood Birds

It was overcast and grey this morning, with bits and pieces of rain falling, as usual I walked over to the lakes first thing, via the Ashes Lane Fields, where only a flock of 6 REDWING that flew over was of any note.

On the lakes the KINGFISHER was once again present, as was a GREY HERON, only a few MOORHENS and the COOT pair were seen on the water, plus the MUTE SWAN family, the adults of which had flown the short distance to join their youngster on the small lake, it seems the young bird is not confident to fly off, or perhaps lacks the skill necessary to get airborne on such a small body of water that is hemmed in by trees?

A look around the Scrubby Woods wasn't producing much, a couple of BULLFINCH were seen, but then everything started to alarm call in the area of the Tawny Owl roost, it was quite something to see, there were GOLDCRESTS, TREECREEPER, NUTHATCH, COAL TIT, BLUE TIT, GREAT TIT, BLACKBIRD, SONGTHRUSH, CHAFFINCH and JAY all calling and scolding, no doubt they had found the Owl, but I couldn't see it!! The fuss all died down, and I moved off, but not before seeing a GREY WAGTAIL (56) flyover the main lake, a good species to get for the December list  :-)

I made my way back across the Ashes lane Field, where I saw not a single Meadow Pipit, I wondered where they had gone to, until I spied the SPARROWHAWK sitting on the fence post !

Arriving at the Greenhouse Grounds I found the regular GOLDFINCH flock on the Alder Trees, but no Siskin were with them, nor were there any sightings of the Kestrels. Another 17 Redwing flew over, as did a couple of HERRING GULLS, then scanning the sheep pasture a flock of 40 - 50 BLACK HEADED GULLS were seen, along with the ROOKS and JACKDAWS, but that was about it for the day as the rain pepped up.

A couple of images from my archives...............

Black Headed Gull

Black Headed Gull