I don't think many birders like February, and this last ten days has reminded me why. It's been crap. The general malaise in my case has been caused by a mixture of bad luck, bad planning, and bad birding.
Let me take you back to last Sunday. Morton Bagot was quite well attended, with me, Dave, and Mike H slogging round on a cold grey morning. I'm struggling to think of anything we saw which could be worthy of a mention, but based on today's effort the 38 Lapwings which were present are starting to look pretty good.
One bird I should have seen was Red-crested Pochard. A drake popped up on the Earlswood Whatsapp feed during that dire Sunday morning as having been identified just as it flew off. Much later in the afternoon, as the light was beginning to fade, an update had it as still present. I decided it would be too dark if I went immediately and gambled it might be there next day. So on a cold Monday morning I walked around Engine Pool and confirmed it had gone.
My wandering during the week didn't look too promising. On Tuesday I trudged around Church Hill, a north Redditch housing estate, without seeing anything better than Grey Wagtail. There were lots of birds though and it proved to be a much better morning than Friday. My plan that morning was to drive north of Redditch to an area at the edge of my Circle. I didn't get there. Driving along the narrow Icknield Street I met a cyclist coming in the opposite direction and pulled into a farm entrance to let him pass. Shortly afterwards I could hear strange noises coming from the car. By the time I'd pulled over, the puncture caused by driving over a screw which was embedded in the tyre had been exacerbated to the extent that the tyre walls were wrecked. I had to be rescued by the RAC.
And so to today. Another dreadful visit to Morton Bagot. The only highlight being the site's first Coot of the year.
I might just as well have spent the week looking out of the kitchen window.
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