Wednesday 29 June 2016

Early sunshine soon disappeared this morning, and a strengthening SW wind  brought rain across the area by mid afternoon.

I took advantage of the decent start to the day, making my 10th and final full patch walk of June, in which I recorded a reasonable tally of 44 species, Sparrowhawk, Long Tailed Tit and Bullfinch being the only regularly seen species that I failed to locate today.

As I checked up on the KESTREL family at the Greenhouse Grounds ( which go from strength to strength) I noted the first fledgling PIED WAGTAIL of the year, an expected addition to the 2016 ''successfully Bred'' patch list, which now stands at 33. As I left the Greenhouse Grounds an immature GREY WAGTAIL (64) flew in and alighted in an Alder Tree, the first to visit my patch seen since April, a welcome addition to the June list, bringing it to 64, just one short of the mean tally for the previous 5 Junes.

Flyovers from both LESSER BLACK BACKED and HERRING GULL helped todays list, but little else was in the sky, just a single SWIFT, a couple of dozen local SWALLOWS and a BUZZARD were all that were seen.

 There was no sign of the Turtle Dove at the scrubby Woods, but it may still be present, access is very difficult now that the undergrowth has grown over all the trackways, so I couldn't have a proper check.


This JAY has become a regular visitor to my garden feeders, enjoying the peanuts that I put out for it :-)


Close up crop of the beautiful and striking wing feathers

3 comments:

Derek Faulkner said...

Another awful summer's day Warren, really gusty winds here. You need to get somebody in those scrubby woods and give them a good clearing out so you can walk round OK.

Warren Baker said...

Derek, all the woods need is an access trail, the rest is prime habitat!

Derek Faulkner said...

Just a gentle wind up Warren.