Pittswood Birds

There were some long sunny spells this morning for a change, but the wind soon got up, bringing in heavy showers for the afternoon.

A view over the sheep pasture and paddocks at Migrant Alley, nice to look at, all neat and tidy, not so nice for the wildlife though.

I took advantage of the break in the poor weather and got round for a full patch walk, which produced a total of 45 bird species, nothing new for the month or year lists, but enough of interest to keep me happy.

There were four Gull species out on the sheep pasture at Migrant Alley early in the walk, with 67 BLACK HEADED GULLS, 3 COMMON GULLS 7 HERRING GULLS and a single LESSER BLACK BACKED GULL, a BUZZARD put them all to flight for a while as it flew low over, but they soon settled back down again.

Herring Gull

I had a SKYLARK singing in the rough grassland between the Greenhouse Grounds and the Greenhouse Copse, plus a lone YELLOWHAMMER was also seen there, which allowed me some distant photo's. A few SISKIN and the female KESTREL were also seen around the Greenhouses.

I don't get too many chances at photographing Yellowhammers - there aren't many about nowadays, so I was pleased with these.

The MEADOW PIPITS were the main attraction at the Ashes lane Fields, as most of the FIELDFARE and REDWINGS had moved elsewhere. The Wet Woods and Scrubby Woods provided some good views of LONG TAILED TIT, COAL TIT, NUTHATCH, TREECREEPER, and GOLDCREST, but no Bullfinch today. The only GREAT SPOTTED WOODPECKER noted was one that drummed and the only GREEN WOODPECKER noted was one that called in the distance. The warm-ish sunshine encouraged singing from WREN, ROBIN, DUNNOCK, MISTLETHRUSH, SONGTHRUSH, GREENFINCH, CHAFFINCH and STOCK DOVE.

Treecreeper in the Scrubby Woods.

The only birds on the lakes today were 6 CANADA GEESE and 4 MOORHENS, pretty poor even for these lakes!