Pittswood Birds

Continual light rain and a moderate SW wind made it quite miserable first thing this morning, the rain gave way to drizzly showers by mid morning, but the wind strengthened further

In the poor conditions not much was noted, my 3 hour visit was spent around Migrant Alley, the Greenhouse Copse and the Ashes Lane fields. A HOBBY that flew over Ashes Lane, pursued by a gang of frantic SWALLOWS was the undoubted highlight for the morning. A 40 minute sky watch from my seat wasn't too productive, with a string of HERRING GULLS, a flock of 9 BLACK HEADED GULLS and a single LESSER BLACK BACKED GULL all seen, plus a SPARROWHAWK circled over, the immature KESTRELS moved around the greenhouse grounds, calling for food continually. Other noteworthy flyovers included 2 single YELLOWHAMMERS, only the second records this month, and a GREY HERON, a dozen SWIFTS were feeding over the sheep pasture for a short while.

WHITETHROAT, BLACKCAP and CHIFFCHAFF gave some very short bursts of song from around the Greenhouse Copse, where GREEN and GREAT SPOTTED WOODPECKERS were also seen, other than that, it was a pretty 'hum drum' visit today.

Once again it was a camera-less day, no exciting Dragons or Butterflies out in this weather, all I have in the 'Blog photo folder' is this CHAFFINCH, taken from my garden a few days ago, speaking of my garden, the Sparrowhawk made it's first visit here since April. It will no doubt become a regular now!