Sunday February 14

A sunny morning with a rather sharp north-easterly breeze.

I joined Dave for our now customary Redpoll hunt. This produced only about 40 birds, all Lessers, by 10.30am. We decided on a quick march around the patch, which produced very little.

There were 55 Teal and two Green Sandpipers at the flash field and a charm of about 20 Goldfinches.

Goldfinches

However, by Stapenhill Wood we found the rest of the Redpoll flock, about 60 birds, but accidentally flushed them while trying to get into a position where the sun would be behind us.

I had to leave Dave in order to get back to Lyn, but returned 40 minutes later to find he had followed the flock back down to the usual field, only to see half of them head back north. We looked at the remainder, eventually scoping one fairly interesting bird, but we eventually consigned it to being probably just a pale Lesser.