Wednesday 5 October 2011

It's almost too dark to see any birds first thing in the morning on the way into work now, but a KESTREL sitting on a fence post at Migrant Alley was just visible.

After work, in some grey and windy conditions, I thought it looked good for a bit of Skywatching, so I went over to my favoured seat at Migrant Alley, but before sitting, I had a walk around the sheep pasture and horse paddocks. I couldn't find yesterdays Whinchat, but I found three WHEATEARS, two of them were probably yesterdays birds. Also there was a flock of around 200 STARLINGS mingling with the 70 - 100 ROOKS, and nearby on the hedge the LINNET flock was making forays out into the pasture and back.

I finished the circuit of the fields and sat on my seat just in time to see a GREEN WOODPECKER fly off the fence beside me, the tall hedge on the other side was mostly empty, just a couple of BLUE TITS and BLACKBIRDS, while the Greenhouse Complex behnd that, had a small flock of GOLDFINCH'S on the thistles and 4 PIED WAGTAILS were on the glass rooves.

In my 90 minute vigil, I noted flocks of HOUSE MARTINS continually coming over, each flock having 20 - 50 birds in it, also 2 SKYLARKS, 1 MEADOW PIPIT, 1 GREAT SPOTTED WOODPECKER, 2 SWALLOWS, and the months first BUZZARD (57) The Rooks and Starlings were being continually put up, but the only thing I saw annoying them was a large female SPARROWHAWK.

I also saw a Peacock butterfly, which was hardly able to fly, the first ive seen since the 28th July!

Wheatear


Wheatear


Linnet


Linnet

5 comments:

Pete Woodruff said...

Shorter days Warren, lights on and curtains shut by 6.30 this evening, wind and rain outside....oh dear.

The pics are great.

Bob Bushell said...

I haven't seen many Linnets this year, I wonder why?

Marc Heath said...

What settings are you using for your photos. It seems that the autofocus is sometimes not locking on to my eye? Not a criticism of your work, just an opinion I have seen.

Chris said...

Hi Warren,
The darkness is also coming over here as well as the snow which is already on the top of the mountains! I would love to see a linnet, still not on my list ;-)

Jason K said...

Your Wheatear looks cock-on for an Autumn 'greenland' Warren