Pittswood Birds

On a bright and frosty late Autumn morning, I set off out on another full patch walk, the 7th of the month, but the three and a half hour visit proved bitter sweet, with a low tally of just 37 species recorded, however one of those species was CROSSBILL (102, 59) when a flock of 8 flew over the Lake / Scrubby Woods area, calling loudly, a new species for the year list and just the third year of the fifteen so far recorded, in which this species has been seen.

That proved to be the only highlight of the morning, but the woodland parts of my patch yielded plenty of the regular common bird species; GREAT TIT, BLUE TIT, LONG TAILED TIT, COAL TIT, CHAFFINCH, BULLFINCH, NUTHATCH, TREECREEPER, GOLDCREST, GREAT SPOTTED WOODPECKER, GREEN WOODPECKER, BLACKBIRD, SONGTHRUSH, MISTLETHRUSH, JAY, WREN, ROBIN and DUNNOCK were all very active in the frosty conditions.

The farmland areas of my patch proved very poor again though, just a couple of MEADOW PIPITS were on the Ashes Lane Fields, Migrant Alley had flyovers from single SKYLARK, 4 FIELDFARE, plus the regular Gull species of BLACK HEADED and HERRING GULL.

The Greenhouse Grounds was home, as usual, to the KESTREL pair, plus a few PIED WAGTAILS and GOLDFINCHES were around the place.

The addition of Crossbill to the year list moves this years tally of 102 species into 9th place out of 15. Reaching last years tally of 104 looks a possibility, but the record yearly tally achieved in 2010, which was 113, looks well out of reach now.