January 12th through to the months end.

 January turns out to fairly quiet.

With out any long periods of cold weather and it being a mixture of rain, wind and more rain with the odd sunny day thrown in to cheer us up there was no need reason for birds to move around the country. We have had to make do with the odd good bird; displaying male Peregrine, sunbathing Little Owl, 2 Lesser Redpolls, and 1 Skylark. The Water Rails are still present as is the Brambling but he is really hard to locate. That was about it until last Sunday 28th, when on a lunchtime walk with my wife but only my bins I jammed into 3 Parrot Crossbills perched in one of the big pines in the Cricket Pen, area 31. If it were for the Siskin's flying up into the pines I would never have looked. They were on view for 6 or so seconds then the nearby Redwing flock spooked them and they were off. How superb was that? 






















   There are 10 nests in the photo but just out of view are a 4 more nests. There hasn't been this many 
   on what is the island they first nested on in 1967. They moved to the Bandstand Island when the 3 
   large Elms that had died of Dutch Elm disease finally toppled. 


   Kestrels in area 32.





   This male Sparrowhawk regularly visits this bird bath in one of the park lodges.








   A flock of around 8 Long-tailed Tit's in areas 1 & 2 include this pale headed bird.

   https:///watch?v=YQ1lbZmEEmM
   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a8AW_ibMio8






   Blackcap visiting a feeder in the Bird Sanctuary.



   Redwing and Mistle Thrush. There was a large increase into the park of Redwings in the last
   2 weeks of the month, even though it wasn't that cold in the UK
  




   Stock Dove's displaying over the Bandstand Island.










   Carrion Crow playing catch high over the lake.



   Common Gull








   Inappropriate feeding of waterfowl does the birds no favours. The increased number of corvids 
   attracted to the handouts has caused a decline in the successful breeding of ducks due to egg 
   predation of ground nesting species like the Tufted Duck (below).



Comments

Cross bills and lesser repoll
Marvellous indeed
Lesser Redpolls were once regular winter visitors, not anymore. The Parrot Crossbills a total shock.