Thank you to those who took time to leave me some bird information.
The seminar “Ecosystems Services and Do we need Birds?” was quite informative, though there is still a lot of work to be done in the field to make a case for birds, that is if there is case to be had.
I only managed a couple of quick stop off’s looking for birds. The weather was quite atrocious, with heavy showers on the Tuesday, sleet and snow throughout yesterday and todays promised sun only glimpsed briefly.
Below are a selection of snaps that I took, but the light was awful.
A cob at Eyebrook Reservoir tries to bring down a young cob
A BH Gull looks miserable in one of several heavy showers on Tuesday.
This Dabchick also seemed disturbed by the downpour, trying to take off twice and failing. I have never seen one standing up and using a runway before.
Once the showers had subsided BH Gulls were picking things from the surface.
Osprey male comes in to land on the female
The sun pops out and makes a world of difference, however it brought out other raptors.
The Red Kite investigated the male Osprey as he ate a fish
There were good numbers of Tree and House Sparrows in my brothers garden along with a few Yellow Hammers.
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I bumped into the owner of this blog at 08.15. Tony Duckett promptly found me a lifer, a singing Willow Warbler in the SW corner of The Holme, area 9. (Tony told me he had also found another Willow Warbler earlier this morning in Queen Mary's Gardens.)
Blackcap 8: areas 9 (The Holme perimeter), 10 (Regent's College perimeter), 22 (Chester Gate), 31, 40 (3 males singing simultaneously) and 42 (Outer Circle end).
Chiffchaff 4: areas 1, 17, 31 and 40 ('Dave', singing 'Take Four').
Shelduck 3 [pr (incl. winged duck) area 8; 1m in area 36 - the second, free-flying duck appears to have shoved off within the last 48 hours].
Shoveler 2 (pr in area 8, SE side of Heron Island).
Black-headed Gull 1 (first-winter plumage), on an area 8 fencepost.
(One of the Lesser Black-backed Gulls on the fenceposts was an adult born in Scandinavia, with its mantle as black as a Great Black-backed's.)