Welcome to Winter!

This morning I revisited St. Mary's after a rush down after sixth form yesterday to catch up with my second black redstart for patch, only my 4th in Britain, and it was a very good decision! Met up with Alan Curry in the south bay around half 8 and immediately it put in an appearance, spending most of it's time on the cliff and seaweed darting backwards and forwards. After a while, I went off and left Alan to photograph it and checked out the rest of the patch, with very little around apart from the 'resident' great-spotted woodpecker. 

So after a while, I decided to go back to see the redstart again and this time, it showed like a dream. I found by just sitting a rock and allowing the bird to get used to me, it was very tame indeed, coming within 5 feet at one point, and posing for me in the morning sun. Morning well spent!

What a stunner!

Also spent some time photographing these guys on the rocks...

Big Waters (well a tiny bit!)

Sorry about the lack of blogs, haven't been out much! Just arrive back from Big Waters. The pond is completely frozen apart from a tiny bit of water in the middle. There was a flock of fieldfare in the trees on ur way into the reserve which set us up for a good day birding. We made our way to the members hide after that. As we went in, Alan Johnson (the warden for Big Waters) told me to look at the top of a tree over in the corner of the pond and when I did, I saw that there was a female sparrowhawk sitting there! A good start. That would explain why there were no birds at the feeders. However, she soon left and the little birds returned in their numbers. There was 5 robins, blue tits, great tits, coal tits, blackbirds, a wren, chaffinches, greenfinches and goldfinches. As we sat and took many photos, the woodpecker dropped in. But very briefly. After that it went a bit quiet for a while until 2 nice surprises turned up. These were a male bullfinch and a male siskin. There was also 2 pheasants that strolled in towards the end just as we were leaving to watch Newcastle on the telly! A good day!

Robin Bullfinch Siskin Wren

Big Waters

Been to Big Waters this evening to see what was around. We went to the main hide first. The feeders were quiet with tree sparrows, robins, greenfinches and a goldfinch. The Great Spotted Woodpecker did show on the feeders but just very briefly. I still haven’t caught up with the sparrowhawk that lives there yet put hopefully I will soon! The pond had 2 Great Crested Grebes, Mallard, Teal, Cormorants and Mute Swans. Two moorhens were fighting on the other side of the pond so not much of interest. I had been the day before and seen the kingfisher but at the other hide. We wanted to see it in better light as it was a dull day last time we saw it. We went round to the other hide and I heard it call as soon as we got there. We opened the windows and it was sitting there with a fish. It gave us brilliant views both times we were there and if you haven’t seen it yet, it is well worth the journey! KingfisherRobin