Thursday 30 August 2012

I just about covered all parts of my patch this morning before a rash of showers started to blow through, it wasn't quite as busy with passage birds as yesterday, the Sedge Warblers from the Greenhouse Grounds had moved on, and there were no Sand martins or Yellow Wagtails over Migrant Alley.

The College Grounds and gardens were the most productive place, as of recent visits, where a GREY WAGTAIL was seen at the Stables, only the 3rd record this month. The Gardens once again had a mixed feeding flock, the best of which included a SPOTTED FLYCATCHER, a BLACKCAP, at least 6 CHIFFCHAFFS, and 4 LONG TAILED TITS.

The Greenhouse Grounds, with the Raspberry dump was checked thoroughly, here were found a couple of WHITETHROAT, lots of WRENS, DUNNOCKS, BLACKBIRDS, GOLDFINCH'S, a few GREENFINCH and CHAFFINCH, plus a WILLOW WARBLER, just singles of Blackcap and Chiffchaff were seen here. With the local SWALLOWS that feed over the Greenhouses were a few HOUSE MARTINS, which didn't stay around too long.

A HOBBY flew over, as did a pair of CORMORANT, only the second record for this species this month, also a KESTREL was in its usual hunting spot to the front of the Greenhouses.

The Pub Field is a little disappointing at the moment, despite it not being ploughed or harrowed yet, only a few WOODPIGEON were on it today, with two STOCK DOVES, as for the Tree Nursery, it has become too difficult to fully explore, as the vegetation is now so dense it hides the big holes that were left in the ground after the shrubs and saplings were extracted, making it dangerous for an old boy like me to walk through safely  :-)  However I did note some common stuff where I could get access, the likes of SONGTHRUSH, ROBIN, GREEN WOODPECKER, GREAT TIT, BLUE TIT, JAY, and CHAFFINCH all went on the daylist.

A LESSER WHITETHROAT was in the Small Holding and a small feeding flock of birds were at the nearby edge of the Wet Woods, only a couple of BULLFINCH that were with them were new for the day though. Over at the Lakes a KINGFISHER was a welcome sight, but the water held just 2 MALLARD, 2 CANADA GEESE and 4 MOORHEN  - a disappointing set of water bodies really, not visited by much water fowl due to many factors. The adjacent Scrubby Woods had some of the familiar woodland species, added to the day list from here were; TREECREEPER, NUTHATCH, COAL TIT, GOLDCREST, and GREAT SPOTTED WOODPECKER, a few Blackcaps and Chiffchaffs were noted from here too.

Not a bad visit today, 48 species in all, but with just one August visit left, I dont think i'll be setting a monthly record for the number of species seen, needing 6 more just to equal the best August total, and 3 more to equal the second best  :-)

Photo's today come mostly from the College Grounds :-
Long Tailed Tit
Chiffchaff
Chiffchaff
Immature Blackbird

6 comments:

ShySongbird said...

Hi Warren, the tree nursery sounds like a minefield! Judging by your sunny photos you have had better weather there again, no sun here :-(

Love the pics of the LTT and Chiffchaff among the berries even though they look so A word ;-) I can see I'll have to give in soon it certainly has that feel now especially with the nights drawing in.

Marc Heath said...

Some nice quality shots Warren, what will the last day of the month bring?

Warren Baker said...

Songbird,
Thats exactly what the Tree Nursery is like!

Rain on and off here all afternoon, better tomorrow :-)

Warren Baker said...

Marc
With the wind in the North tomorrow, I may just squeeze in another species for the month ;-)

Chris said...

Well seeing the wind outside and how north it's coming, it might bring you some Icelandic birdies tomorrow ;-) It's getting pretty cold over here now and even if I reached 93 species, I'm not sure I'll get over the 94 to beat my year record ;-)
Nice pictures of the day Warren...

Rohrerbot said...

With such weather events, you must look forward to some random birds. Let me just tell you that our storms have brought in some very very tropical visitors! From Central America! So it's a bit crazy as we're all chasing these exotics around the state just to get a glimpse of them. Good luck! The Long Tailed Tit has a wonderful beauty to it. Have fun tomorrow.