Monday January 13

I took the day off today, although most of the morning was spent paying our respects at the funeral of our friend Nikki.

It was a beautiful morning and after the service I had an hour to go to the patch with the intention of adding to my photo list. I stayed around Netherstead and began with a rather better shot of a Robin than the one I "ticked" yesterday.

Sitting in the car waiting for something to come close is actually a bit frustrating as I had plenty of chances to get shots of other species already on the photo year list, but I did add:

17. Great Tit

and

18. Carrion Crow

Of the remaining pictures, I think this Yellowhammer is better than my previous effort.

male Yellowhammer

I didn't see anything remotely unusual. The best bird was probably a circling Sparrowhawk.
I rang Mike while I was there as I knew he was visiting his own patch today. He sounded more positive, and was catching up with some of the easy passerines previously unrecorded.

This evening he has confirmed he has added another nine species, the best being a Treecreeper. He also saw the Woodcock again. It sounds as though Haselor scrape remains absolutely dire though.

Wild Swans

A sunny and frosty morning, although it clouded over after an hour. Dave got there before I did, and I quickly discovered I had left my notebook at home. I was keen to start adding birds to my photo list, but my initial attempts at a fly over Raven (image too small), and Fieldfare (out of focus) failed to make the grade. In the distance I picked up an adult Common Gull flying east; a very handy year tick but too distant to get a shot of.

I was nevertheless keen to practice photographing birds in flight in case the "big one" flew over, so my next attempt passed my very generous quality control criterion.

10. Rook

This is the typical view of Rooks at the patch. I really shouldn't put the next one in as the bird looked away to spoil what would have been a very nice shot. But what the hell, a tick is a tick.

11. Robin

Around this time we spotted a Great Spotted Woodpecker, which was another year-tick although I didn't realise it at the time. A number of Fieldfares and Redwings were feeding in the frosty grass at the paddocks, and with Jon Yardley approaching from beyond them I decided it was time to add another common winter bird.

12. Fieldfare (and Redwings)

The three of us teamed up and we wandered along the path towards the manure heap, which contained a good bird for the year, Grey Wagtail.

13.  Grey Wagtail

and also

14. Reed Bunting

This area held good numbers of Yellowhammers, Linnets and Reed Buntings, and among them we heard the distinctive calls of a Redpoll. It was seen briefly and confirmed to be Lesser Redpoll before the whole lot took off and we lost it.

As we reached the pool I suggested we try flushing Snipe to see if we could see any Jack Snipe. This produced 25 Common Snipe and two Jack Snipe. There was no chance of a photo as they were miles too quick. Jon located the Stonechat on the far side of the pool.

The flash contained 114 Lapwings and a Grey Heron, but still no ducks. On the return journey we investigated the tin shed and found several Barn Owl pellets. 

We think that some of these were quite recent, so although I understand that Barn Owls had a terrible year last year, it seems ours is still here. We investigated the contents of a pellet. I don't know whether the picture taken gives enough information to identify its grizzly contents.

The upper mandible of a rodent sp

So now to the exciting bit. Luckily I had got my camera at the ready as we were attempting to relocate a "brown" Bunting. Evidently Dave heard a single "honk" which caused him to look up and call to out to us. Overhead, 11 wild Swans were heading south. I believe they were Bewick's Swans, but I have to admit it was not possible to see any bill detail, so the identification has to rely on jizz. Fortunately I got a shot of them.

15. Bewick's Swans

We had a mid field discussion after they had gone, and decided they had looked narrow necked, and small bodied. Dave reckoned the honk was quite high pitched. So on balance we have decided to call them Bewick's Swans. A Morton Bagot tick.

I have subsequently heard that they were later seen flying over Salford Prior GP.

The day had not quite reached a conclusion however, and a final, rather more mundane, year tick was added when we found a single Coot on the dragonfly pools.

16. Coot

As a final postscript to the Swan episode. Dave has just phoned to point out an instructive photo in "Flight identification of European seabirds" and also to tell me he has read that a single call (as opposed to a multiple honk) is strongly suggestive of Bewick's Swan because Whooper Swan typically gives three or four calls. This is news to me, but after checking with the Collins Guide etc he is correct, and  it firms up the ID.

Wednesday Jan 8

Not much birding for me this week, although I did see a couple of Peregrines in central Birmingham yesterday.

Mike rang to update me on his latest visit to Middle Spernal Pools. He reckons the shooting there has made any wildfowl extremely jumpy, but he did add two year-ticks today, Wigeon and Cormorant.

On the patch at last

After a frosty night, the day dawned cold and calm. However, the cloud cover increased throughout the morning.

I began by seeing what I could photograph from the car before Dave arrived. A Linnet eventually came in range to get the photo year list off the mark.

1. Linnet

Closely followed by a Redwing.

2. Redwing

Both these species were well represented today. I estimated 100 Linnets and 60 Redwings. Dave arrived and I took a shot of a male Kestrel which in flight was seen to have a damaged wing as a primary feather dangled down. It looked healthy enough on a post though.

3. Kestrel

Shortly after this a year-tick calamity occured (for me), as Dave spotted a Kingfisher which flew rapidly past us. It didn't call, and I just didn't see it. This is a potential banana skin as I have never seen one here before July in any year and the species is not 100% guaranteed to turn up.

Moving on, we tried heading towards the south end in the hope of relocating it. But as expected we failed. Eventually we were back on our usual track and were walking past the pool when the Stonechat popped up.

4. Stonechat

Unfortunately, the only time it was close there were too many branches obscuring it, so I ended up pursuing it for a record shot. This bird may well winter successfully, but if we get some severe cold it may not survive, and like Kingfisher although we should get one again next autumn, its not guaranteed

The flash continued its recent poor run, but I thought I'd add a few of its inhabitants to the photo list.

5. Mallard (Snipe in background)

6. Lapwing

You can never get close enough to even the closest flash to get anything better than a record shot. Beyond the flash the small pool contained a Mute Swan.

7. Mute Swan

This bird appears to be a sub-adult.

At Stapenhill Wood among a good flock of Linnets and Chaffinches, I spotted a female Brambling. Another bird good enough to warrant a record shot.

8. Brambling

 I may see this bird again, but it is missable. You also never know whether next autumn will bring any.

Walking back across the stubble field I got some flight shots of Skylarks, but the images are so small that I will hope to get something better another day. Dave headed off, but I stayed a bit longer hoping to photograph something else. In the end all I got was a blurred flight shot of a Buzzard, and some pictures of an uncooperative Yellowhammer.

9. Yellowhammer

So my year-list is off the mark with a slightly under par 47 species.

Late news: Mike paid a very brief visit to Haselor scrape. All he saw was some Mallards. Tick.

Garden birding

This morning I am resigned to waiting in for a man who is to measure our front room for a new carpet. Not quite the high powered birding weekend I had envisaged.

Still, it allows time to play with the camera. An ornamental rowan we planted a few years ago is suddenly discovered by the local birds when the berries are ripe enough to eat, and for about a week we enjoy watching them strip it.

Mostly Blackbirds, but we do get some less regular visitors, such as:

male Blackcap

Song Thrush

and

Redwing

Must dash. Carpet man has just arrived.

It's a new year, and we're off (sort of)

January 1 dawned grey and damp, and neither I, nor Mike, could visit our respective patches.

My excuse was that I was in Glossop celebrating the new year with friends. My only birding was achieved on the walk down the High Street, where I got a shot of some Black-headed Gull action before my camera ran out of battery.

Today, January 2, I got the dreaded text from Mike. He was up and running with a Woodcock at Middle Spernal Pool. This is a species I haven't seen on my patch for over a year.

However, although he is off the mark, his actual list was a pretty modest 29 species. Mike was keen to point out he doesn't get the variety of farmland birds I do (excuses, excuses).

I suspect Haselor Scrape will be a valuable string to his bow as soon as he remembers its part of his patch.

The forecast looks pretty poor for the weekend, so I might have to be a bit more flexible to make the most of any dry weather.

Eureka

I have treated myself to a new camera. A Canon Powershot SX50, and went to the patch to road test it and compare the results with my old Nikon Coolpix digiscoping camera. All went well as far as photos are concerned.

Here is one I took by digiscoping a Reed Bunting

and here is one with my new camera:

The results look pretty similar, but the digiscoped image is cropped, while the shot taken with the new camera is not.

Brother-in-law technical support not required, a universal card reader has done the trick.

Anyway, on the camera is a very nice photograph of a Little Owl, a dodgy photo of a Grey Wagtail, and several shots of Reed Buntings etc. Hopefully I will be able to share these with you at some point.

Now is that time:

It was a cold and frosty morning, and with frozen water everywhere I didn't see much else.

A quick summary of the year reveals that I have equaled my previous best year here, (2010) recording 118 species plus Feral Pigeon. Highlights were the Marsh Harrier, Great Grey Shrike, Mealy Redpoll, Whooper Swans, and Short-eared Owls.

There were a number of other good species for the patch, like Whimbrels, Red Kite, Ringed Plover, Black-tailed Godwit, Goshawk, Merlin, and Corn Bunting, while several more expected species only just sneaked onto the list with one day only sightings, eg Greenshank, Common Sandpiper, Oystercatcher, Little Egret and (disastrously) Tree Sparrow. Birds I failed to record in 2013 included Great Black-backed Gull, Shoveler, and Pintail. The only species I know to have occurred without me seeing it was Crossbill, seen by Matt Willmott...Oh, and a Common Tern seen by Jon Yardley. I had almost airbrushed that one from my memory as I was there at the time, but not close enough to see it.

2014 promises more competition. I still intend to try for a photo list, and Mike is still up for trying a rival list at Middle Spernal Farm Pools plus Haselor scrape, and yes I have signed up for the Patchwork challenge again.

Happy New Year to everyone reading this blog.