Saturday 7 February 2015

Yesterday's News


Over the past few days my birding has been limited due to attending the above beer festival, and as I write I have just returned from yet another very pleasurable afternoon sampling a variety of real ales! 

Yesterday morning I headed down to the estuary in calm, crisp conditions and it was a pleasure to be out. The usual mix of hedgerow species greeted me as I walked through the linear Hawthorn scrub including Goldcrest and Long-tailed Tit

 Walking down to the estuary you pass a small reedbed and at this time of
year I enjoy the contrast of colour between the grey seed heads and 
golden stems.

Looking towards the mouth of the estuary and the lakeland fells beyond.

Out on the estuary were the usual mix of waders and wildfowl including 34 Redshanks, 1,440 Pink-footed Geese, 40 Curlews, 70 Wigeon, 722 Herring Gulls, 22 Shelducks, 117 Lapwings, eleven Teal and 80 Dunlins. Walking back over the saltmarsh to have a look on the pool I had two Rock Pipits and on the pool itself were 17 Tufted Ducks, three Pochards, five Little Grebes and five Goldeneyes

 Tufted Ducks

Before heading to the beer festival I called at my feeding station and I had yet more Ravens in the form of two calling birds; at last the Ravens were singing! Numbers of birds at the feeding station over the past couple of weeks have been fairly light and all I had today were 32 Tree Sparrows, seven Chaffinches, a Great Spotted Woodpecker, two Yellowhammers and five Fieldfares.

The weather looks fit for some ringing tomorrow and fingers crossed I'll be out at the water treatment works. 

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