Another week passes and in the last week there has been the long awaited arrival of Fieldfares .The first real numbers were seen on Thursday when with the east wind 200 plus passed southwards with a few Redwing (20 plus),tagging along .I was woken on Thursday at 4.45am with a Tawny Owl calling from just outside the cottage.
On Friday it was not until 4pm until I got onto the patch after work but this turned out to be a great thing as at 4.15pm the 87th species for the year for the patch turned up in the form of a hunting Barn Owl which cruised back and forth along the magic hedgerow , a great bird , just stunning.
Fieldfares passed south even at that late hour with 220 over and 50 plus Redwing passed in all directions.
I had intended to hit the patch on Saturday but there was torrential rain even with hail thrown in so it really was a quick jaunt but it was obvious that the rain had grounded a large number of Fieldfares and there were up too 600 plus feeding around the top fields ,to see these birds Willow and I had to get very wet and very dirty as the mud was very deep .It was only a few weeks ago it was as dry as a bone up there .
So we were up and at em on Sunday and after all the rain the day dawned clear and there had been a frost. It was a lovely sight with a mist over the river meadows and the sun rising through it ,the Moon was also clearly visible and when flocks of Woodpigeons started to appear from north and pass over in a southerly direction I thought we were going to get another vis mig spectacular, as it happened 500 plus passed over in quick time but the passage then petered our as quickly as it had started.
I was ready for a mass Thrush invasion but was left a tad disappointed with totals of 74 plus Fieldfare, 25 plus Redwing ,4 Mistle Thrush, 20 plus Blackbird and 7 plus Song Thrush which included some rather grey continental birds.
Around 100 plus Starling passed over in a westerly direction, we do not seem to have had the usual numbers this year.
On the pasture maybe a sign of cold weather to come with an influx of 53 plus Skylark including a flock of 35 plus , but only 4 Meadow Pipits today .The rest seem to have moved on. The freshly tilled field attracted 6 Pied wagtails down on the 22 that were around on Wednesday. A small flock of 7 Stock Dove were present .
The invasion of Robins seems to have abated with a rather measly 10 seen dotted around ,but otherwise the hedges were very quiet with just a small flock of 8 Linnets been seen .
Other notable birds were a Raven ,the usual ever calling Green Woodpecker , a calling Jay (it was not seen ) ,2 Buzzards and a flock of 8 Magpie .
So we are at 87 for they year which is already 2 ahead of last year and we still have time to get to the magic 90 ,can we do it ? bring on a good cold snap and we may just get there.
