Thursday 21 April 2011

Only Mad Dogs and 'Birders' Go Out in the Mid-day Sun!

I don't keep any lists of any kind, but if I kept an 'office' list I would have recorded a new species today for the office in the form of a Cuckoo! As I have mentioned previously if I am not doing any field work and I am based in the office I like to work with the window open so I can hear what's going on in the woodland. The Cuckoo was distant and was probably calling from the other side of the wood.

I finished work today for eleven days so I am looking forward to getting out every morning birding and ringing. On my way home I called at my farmland site on Rawcliffe Moss to drop some seed off and I had a walk round in the hope that I could photograph some butterflies. I did photograph some butterflies but they were awful. The pictures that is, not the butterflies!

The first bird I had was a Lesser Whitethroat 'rattling' away from the hedge near the barn, a location that I record them every year. Walking round I had a good number of Willow Warblers with 12 recorded, including 8 singing in the plantation. At the feeding station there were 31 Tree Sparrows and as I headed up the '97' hedge I had my first Whitethroat of the afternoon. In the end I recorded 6 altogether.

 Lesser Whitethroat

On the 'big' field was a female Wheatear and perched up on a fence post I had a pale morph Buzzard. Nine Stock Doves fed in the recently 'tilled' top field and 2-3 Skylarks were on the wing singing. As I walked towards the plantation I had a female Sparrowhawk drift by and as I got to the southern end of the plantation I had my first Garden Warbler for the spring singing from some thick cover. The other new arrival was a singing Sedge Warbler.

As I walked along the western edge of the plantation I heard a Corn Bunting call and looked up and was surprised to see a flock of 26 flying fairly high and heading south. Three Roe Deers and 2 Brown Hares later and it was time for me to head back to the car. We'll be out ringing tomorrow at the 'obs', but I am not sure how well we'll do, but you never know unless you try!

Brown Hare

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