Dipped - Again!!

Desperate to undertake some birding but limited by time, I decided to pay a quick visit to some fairly local lanes this afternoon. My daughter used to go horse riding around here and weekly visits meant I got to know the area quite well. The fields are "prairie type" with few hedgerows but it does attract some birds - I have seen huge flocks of fieldfares and redwing, yellow wagtails, green woodpeckers and merlin plus the occasional hare. I was quite hoping for golden plover which often stop off briefly at this time of year. No such luck today though just large flocks of wood pigeons, rooks, crows and magpies on the stubble fields and I did get a close up view of a jay.







On the way home I stopped off at Shustoke Reservoir and went a short walk. A juvenile Little Gull has been resident here for 9 days now according to Shustoke Reservoir Blog (see link on the right) but, despite scanning every flock of gulls, I failed to see any sign of it - this is not the first time I have "dipped" on a bird at this particular reservoir! Plenty of black-headed gulls, coots, mallard, canada geese, grey heron, cormorants, dabchick, tufted duck and great crested grebe. No sign of any hirundines over the water today though.





Garden Update

The garden is fairly quiet at the moment bird-wise. Since Sunday I have only recorded Magpie 2, wood pigeon 3, blackbird 2, house sparrow 3, coal tit 1, goldfinch 1, blue tit 3, great tit 1, carrion crow 1, long-tailed tit 2, feral pigeon 1, dunnock 2 and great spotted woodpecker 1, for this week's BTO Garden Birdwatch. The coal tit is busy hoarding sunflower hearts all over the garden and it had taken a special liking to a hanging basket as a hiding place until it was mugged by an enterprising great tit! There was a red admiral in the garden on Monday although it didn't hang around long enough for a photo and I saw a small white today.