Friday 1st April

Mixed weather has again brought mixed fortunes on the nature front.

On Tuesday I did a tour of Mersehead Reserve in the hope mainly of seeing some lapwings displaying. There wasn't much around in the fields except a couple of flocks of remaining barnacles. There was more action on the ponds where tufted duck (maybe one scaup), shoveller, wigeon, pintail, whooper swan and shelduck were all apparent.

At the reserve building there had been a sign saying the first chiffchaff had been heard that day. I certainly heard one on the way to Meida Hide and managed to capture the song (though not the actual bird!) on this video in spite of competition from the background rookery.

I did manage to see one on the way to the seashore and think there were about three or four birds actively calling.

A couple of stonechats were playing on the fenceposts near the shore, the first time I've seen them there in several visits. But the most numerous bird on the second half of the walk was definitely the skylark, several of them plying the heavens with their songful ascents and sudden plunges that I still do not understand the meaning of.  There were a few pipits and, yes, some lapwings too - but they weren't displaying.

The bike ride the following day was again affected by rain for half of the run, but there were a couple of red kites and a field full of about 50 greylags between Rhonehouse and Twynholm.  I checked them over and could see no other species of goose among them.

Selection of Greylags

Tuesday 31st January

Mr Henderson gave me a tip as well, when I mentioned that I was targetting twites but thought they were only in the far West of the region.  The result was today's double visit to the Carse Pow estuary at Carsethorn and Southerness Golf Course.

I may have seen them at Carsethorn when a flock of birds went up from a gorse bush with some rather jittery toing and froing but couldn't get close enough to see them with the binoculars as they settled, camouflaged as they were against the brown of the field edge.  The only option was to go closer and most of the flock scattered leaving only two birds on the fence, one of which was unidentifiable and the other a chaffinch.

I patrolled around a bit but in 2 Celsius with a biting Easterly coming in off the estuary, I wasn't for hanging about and went back along the shore, picking up incidental sightings of oystercatcher, shelduck, redshank and dunlin.

A quick circular walk in the surrounding lanes was warmer and produced several hundred barnacle geese, a dozen golden plover (long time, no see) and lone crested duck and pochard on the trout farm - but no twite.

I had no precise area of Southerness Golf Course to target and decided to walk round it clockwise, starting next to the dunes.  There was very little about apart from more waders and for a long time the only birdies I saw were on the 16th green.

Golf courses are bigger than you imagine but even after a half way rest all I could manage was a couple of meadow pipits and a flock of chaffinches next to a farmhouse by the road.

About to give up, I started to follow the track back toward the clubhouse.  After a while I noticed a side track to a farm field in the centre of the golf course, which seemed to have been ploughed up for the cattle.  There were a few rooks around.

Passing along the edge of the field I saw a large flock of small birds go up in the far corner in a similar manner to those at Carsethorn in the morning.

This time I managed to sneak up to the area where they were feeding on the ground without disturbing them unduly and half hid behind a gorse bush, so that they strayed close enough to identify.  There was no mistaking them - buff necks, yellow beaks and long tails - and so it was easy to distinguish them from the few chaffinches mixed in with the flock.  I even attempted a photo which turned into a 'spot the twite' competition.

Spot the Twite (hard)

So another big landmark within a week!  In the past I thought I might have seen the odd twite on occasion but I would now say they were almost certainly linnets.  The only exception was a posse of ground feeding birds I once pursued at Balcary Bay but couldn't identify.  But that was in the summer.