Missing Out

As the weather has become harsher, my attempts to find interesting sightings have largely misfired.

The one new sighting was completely by chance.  As a result of a navigational error on my last long bike ride, I ended up at the village of Broomley, where a good number of redwing were feeding on berries.

There was talk of a mandarin duck on the Derwent in Gateshead, so I took a good scout around but found nothing but a couple of goosander.  Then one was reported at Saltwell Park but it had gone by the time I visited, though I was rather surprised to see a kingfisher flash by.  Not the place I'd have chosen to look for one.

The only thing I did see much of apart from mallards and tufted ducks was a couple of cormorants. By the time a I captured one airing itself, the light had pretty much gone.

Cormorant

Incidentally, folk at the Tennis Club have confirmed seeing salmon going up the weir during November.  I saw one about a month ago but thought it was a freak one-off.  It seems there must be a very late run of salmon on the Derwent.

After a dog walk at Plessey Woods produced nothing but some long-tailed tits and a pigeon last week, Malcolm and I headed for Felton at the weekend as a large number of waxwings had visited a few days before, but once again there was no sign of them, even though we got good tips where to look from local walkers.

I had been hoping to get a video of long-tailed tits mobbing the suet balls I've been putting out in the garden lately, but the best I got was one long-tailed tit and a blue tit:

Long-tailed and blue tit

I might do better after Christmas if I place the feeder nearer the back fence.

Since the sub-zero temperatures and snow arrived  it has got a bit more interesting.  You might not consider a female chaffinch and a juvenile starling rarities but they don't show themselves here regularly at all.

Lastly there was a very dark looking corbid looking around, which I thought was a crow.  It was only when I fiddled with the contrast on the (again very dark) photo I got as it made its exit that some jackdaw features appeared, notably the eye, and I now wonder if it could have been a hybrid.

Jackdaw or Crow?

However I could only find one mention of jackdaw/carrion crow hybridisation on the internet...