Thursday 28th.March 2013

Well , that will teach me to check emails before posting , as when I did do , today's last work day of the Winter had been cancelled , due to the group having done all that was required to finish the season off last week .
So , getting back to yesterday , and my visit to the 'Tree laying' reserve . I was welcomed with some pleasant sunshine , but as usual these days , that didn't last long , with cloud cover increasing throughout the visit . It was also eerily quiet , with no sound of Siskins that could be heard all over last visit . By the time I got to the feeders , a few could be heard , along with Great and Blue Tits and Nuthatch singing it's Spring song . The male Siskins had really come into breeding plumage , and did

look very smart , not saying that the females weren't stunning too . I had a good wander around the reserve , even though the weather was deteriorating , but failed to find John , one of the stalwarts , who's van I had parked next too on my arrival . I was about to give up on finding him , when he appeared from the bottom of a bank . He had been quietly sitting , photographing a pair of Long

Tailed Tits , found at the weekend , busily building their nest in a very open patch of Brambles . As can be seen , the nest was built from the bottom up , and the pair were in the process of building the dome . We stood some 7 mtrs. away , above the nest on the bank and behind a tree , but I think that if we had been standing next to the nest , they would have carried on regardless . The pair continuously returned , each with material in their bills and one at a time dropped in through the hole to place it either inside or on the lip of the hole . The first bird always waited for the second to finish off , before both flew off for more materials . The number of visits to have got the nest to the present state must have been in the hundreds , what a work of art . The funniest part was when one of the birds , probably the female , after several visits , would appear to spin around in the nest to get the right

shape , and as she did so , the nest bulged out where she was pushing . Here the second bird is waiting for the first to finish . We couldn't see an entrance hole , so this will probably be at the present height of the build . We must have spent the best part of an hour watching them , during which time we had three Common Buzzards low overhead and calling , but with all the trees , I was unable to focus on ant of them . We left the LTTs to carry on with the good work and went to a more open area to see if the Red Kite was about , I wish , which it wasn't , but we did get a flyover by a

Sparrowhawk in the deepening gloom . John earlier had had a pair displaying , before I arrived , of course . Above the Sparrowhawk passed a Corvid , I never got binoculars on it till I finished firing off

some shots , but it did have a very powerful bill . Two more Common Buzzards were seen as we left the reserve , but they were just silhouettes in the gloom .
With today's work cancelled , carol suggested doing the monthly shop , but some unexpected sunshine saw me heading out the door , hoping to get that Water Rail on the edge of Bromley in better light than before . Strange birding on a footpath next to an old millstream , with people walking past into the town centre , but there I was , but no sign of the Water Rail . A total of three Grey

Wagtails were seen this visit , with positively one male and one female . I saw three flying but

couldn't be sure of the sex of the third bird . Again , the weather deteriorated on the visit , from sunny periods to snow flurries and overcast . Walking up and down the millstream , a few interesting birds

included a Moorhen on a nest made almost entirely of rubbish , a juvenile Cormorant , that just

appeared in the top of one of the Willows on the island , before feeding with an adult just below the

culvert outfall , then drying off on a perch near the far bank . And the Water Rail , I did have it in sight for no more than 20 seconds amongst the phragmites , looking pretty fed up . It was just standing on some dead reed , then dropped down behind , not to be seen again on the visit . And of

course , during those seconds , the sun was behind clouds . With no other sightings , I made my way home in the snow flurries , and after a hot coffee , we set of to do the monthly shop .
Sorry , still unable to comment on other blogs .