Sunday January 7

A cold and frosty morning for my first visit of the year. I was late again, Dave having seen among other things, a Marsh Tit.

It is of course the start of a new year list, and my first birds were a flock of 38 Lesser Redpolls feeding on Fat Hen.

Lesser Redpoll

We strolled back down the access road before heading towards the pool. We hadn't got too for before Dave got a text. A Whooper Swan was at Marsh Lane GP (his other patch). It would be a good year tick, and after a short period of deliberation he was off. In a further twist he then rang me to say it had been upgraded to Bewick's Swan, which would be a locality tick.

So with Dave elsewhere, I approached the flash field noticing two swans in the field behind it. They were Mute Swans. Oh well, they all count. Also on that field was a big herd of geese, but annoyingly they all took off and disappeared. Later, I saw them again and counted 117 Greylag Geese, and estimated a similar number of Canadas.

Some of the Greylags

While searching for the geese I found the bird of the day, a Common Gull. A tricky species here. It accompanied at least 46 Black-headed Gulls, but was too distant for a photograph. Another good bird was a Little Egret. Just a couple of years ago this would have been a very handy find, but last year they were regular and I have no reason to think that will change.

A few Lapwings flew over, my only waders today, while no ducks, other than Mallard, were present. The flock of corvids contained at least 75 Rooks and 100 Jackdaws. A pair of Ravens flew over.

Ravens

I decided to head back to the flash field in case the Common Gull had flown in. Before I got there I noticed that the Tawny Owl had decided to bask in the sunshine.

Tawny Owl

With nothing new on the flash field I headed back to my car. Here I saw an absolute belter.

Feral Pigeon

Patchwork Challenge says I can tick it! It's not ringed so at least its not a racing pigeon.

My final total for the day was 51 species (plus the Feral Pigeon). Not a bad start.

PS Dave saw the Bewick's Swan. I didn't see a Marsh Tit.