Tuesday 5th. February 2013

I made a morning visit to Sevenoaks Reserve today , but although the sun was shining , well to begin with anyway , very little out of the ordinary was found . Coots , Gulls and Geese were the most abundant birds seen along with the many Lapwings , all vying for position on the few islands still above the vastly raised water level . The most colour was provided by the Willows around the lakes ,

with their orangey hue . 2M and 1F Bullfinches were seen , heard but went un-photographed between the fishermen's car park and Tyler Hide , no doubt a case of them seeing me first . The Alders on the way to Sutton Hide were Siskin free , as were the other Alders I checked on my way around the Reserve .One day I hope to open a flap at Sutton Hide and find a Bittern right outside , but today it was a small gaggle of Canada Geese taking their morning ablutions . A scan of the small inlet did

produce three very static , well camouflaged Common Snipe , but couldn't make up for the lack of a Bittern , or even an elusive Water Rail . On the other side of the East Lake , I did come across one of

the Marsh Tits , a change to find one away from the feeders . Not much further on , a Magpie looked

almost metallic in the Winter sunshine .Mind you , by the time I reached the far end of Long Lake , that sunshine was being throttled by ever increasing cloud . Even Willow Hide couldn't produce a surprise , but on my way back to the VC , the Scarlet Elf Cup / Sarcoscypha coccinea didn't let me

down , appearing on moss covered branches on the ground . A scan of the West Lake failed to find the hoped for drake Goosander which had been seen recently , or any redhead of the species either .
Mind you , as I put my gear back into the car , a Robin , not 5 mtrs. away was trying to tell everyone

that Spring was just around the corner , and in a chink of sunshine too .
On the way home , I called in to one of the other volunteers from the Common work party , who told me last week that he had good numbers of Lesser Redpoll coming daily to his feeders . Having failed to get one in the garden and not seeing one in the wild this Winter , I couldn't resist 'doing a Warren' , and taking up temporary residence in his garden shed . Three Redpolls flew from the feeders as we made our way to the shed , so things looked good . It wasn't long before the odd bird returned , the

first being a male , and after another short wait , a female turned up to feed on the Niger seeds in a

feeder that was being blown about by the strong wind . A maximum of 5 Redpolls were seen during the visit , but male Blackcap , Goldcrest , Blue Tits , Starling and several Goldfinch , relatives of the

Redpolls also came in to feed , all in all , a most enjoyable visit .
On the way home I checked on the juvenile Common Buzzard , finding it on a fence post at the back of the horse field , with a definite 'do not disturb' look about it .