Pittswood Birds

Early rain cleared by 07:15hrs, leaving another bright and blustery day.

I had a 4 hour patch visit today, I wasn't expecting to add much to the months list, except maybe for the Little Owl, which as it happened I didn't, but I did surprisingly add another 4 species to the March tally.

The first of those was LESSER BLACK BACKED GULL (52) two of which flew over the Scrubby Woods whilst I was there listening to the COAL TIT and GOLDCREST singing. The other 3 additions came as I was scanning through the 150 or so BLACK HEADED GULLS on the sheep pasture at Migrant Alley, a COMMON GULL was picked out, but then better than that, 3 MEDITERRANEAN GULLS (53) were also picked out, one of which was in full breeding plumage, a stunning bird ! This brought up the 5th Gull species for the day, as HERRING GULL was already seen flying over earlier in the visit, 5 Gull species in the same visit is quite something for my patch!

Mediterranean Gull, A very distant effort, but worth seeing even cropped this heavily  :-)

This one was not quite in full breeding plumage, but was 5 meters nearer  :-)

As I sat watching over the gull flock on the sheep pasture, I saw a LITTLE EGRET (54) come low over the field, then drop down into an adjacent large garden, when seconds later it flew up again, as the gardener was there! I watched the Egret float over to the Ashes lane Field and alight by the small run off pool that is there, another good patch bird, the second record this year.

I continued to watch the sky, and was surprised to hear the call of a TAWNY OWL (55), which seemed to came from a row of dense leylandi situated in another of the nearby large gardens, I had watched a throng of small birds ''alarming'' around these trees the other morning, but thought it was probably a Magpie they were annoyed at, now I now what it actually was!

A YELLOWHAMMER, 3 single MEADOW PIPITS, 15 FIELDFARE and 4 REDWING were also seen flying over during my sky watch, and as I walked home a COMMON BUZZARD was soaring low over the Greenhouses.