Friday 2nd. January 2009

I have been reading of some fantastic trips and sightings , but I am afraid things have been very flat around here .

The back gardens are still producing plenty of birds , but nothing out of the ordinary . Amazingly , there are still berries on next door's Cotoneaster , regardless of the unceasing attention of Redwings , Fieldfares , Blackbirds , Woodpigeons and Parakeets . Looking back at past posts , I first saw Redwings on the shrub on the 5th. December , now , almost a month later , the supermarket is still open , admittedly it would be a different storey if a larger flock of Thrushes had found it . All the usual suspects appear whenever food is put out , a couple of examples being ,

and in the other neighbour's Eucalyptus ,

After lunch I had an hour around Hayes Farm , main object being to see if anything interesting had dropped in on the Trout Fishery . As I arrived , so too did 10 Canada Geese , bringing the count up to 12 , and although the 2 Little Greebes were still around , there was no sign of the 3 Wigeon or of the 3 Lesser Spotted Ducks ( many thanks ! for the ID from Steve/Kingsdowner ) . The only new species recorded today was a female Kestrel , and she certainly didn't want her photo taken . The large mixed Finch flock seems to have split into 3 or 4 small ones now and the Redwings seemed to have cleared out all the hedgrows now , and are feeding on the ground . I found them even harder to photograph now as they always kept a good distance , regardless how you approached them . Eventually , I just stayed close to one of the horses in the paddock , and let the odd Redwing come to me .

It sort of worked , but they were still very 'twitchy'.