All Quiet

It's noticeable that I haven't posted much recently, for the very good reason that not much has been happening.  Continuing wet weather spells have made going out looking for birds on spec unattractive. Usually there are one or two winter rarities turning up in the North East and staying around, but this year not very much at all is getting reported - a couple of fleeting appearances of little auk flocks at least capturing my interest briefly.

I had hoped to see a few waxwings sometime but it's clear there hasn't been a major irruption this year and for the most only single birds have been reported.  Apparently there haven't been any hawfinches either, except a good deal further South.

Anyway I participated in the Big Garden Birdwatch again this year. The scores were:  Blue tit 5, long-tailed tit 5, 3 each for jackdaw, wood pigeon and collar dove, 2 for coal tit, great tit, nuthatch and bullfinch and just 1 for robin, blackbird and dunnock.  There were no sparrows or starlings, which is mostly the case.

I was pleased with the five long-tailed tits, as they've only appeared sporadically this year and a bit surprised that coal tit didn't outnumber great tit, which it might have done on any other day.  An odd number of collar doves was interesting, since I invariably see them in pairs. 

This was probably the most successful Big Garden Birdwatch I've had here, as in the past they've produced few simultaneous sightings.

Today I got out for only the second lengthy bike ride this year, as the rainy day forecast did not materialise.  As a first sign of better times, I saw my first few clumps of snowdrops this year and later a whole bank of them - as well catching a rare hour of sunshine.

Snowdrops

A One Off...

The weather since New Year has discouraged excursions and cycle trips except for the most hardy.

With some reluctance and in need of exercise, I decided to take a walk in Chopwell Woods on Monday afternoon in freezing but sunny conditions.  I always expect the most common form of animal to be seen in Chopwell Woods is the domesticated wolf, and fear that I won't see anything like the amount of things I would see in the garden anyway.  On Monday, this comprised blue tit, great tit, coal tit, long-tailed tit, sparrow, chaffinch, bullfinch (3) and nuthatch as well as robin and blackbird.

This fear was largely fulfilled - just a few robins and tits around until I noticed an area near Victoria Garesfield where some birds were advancing from a patch of evergreens to drink in a small stream that hadn't frozen.

Some distance away using a lot of zoom, it turned out that one of the birds showing flashes of red turned out not to be a robin, but a redwing.

Redwing

Now this wasn't really a one-off as it's clear from what others have been posting that there is an influx of redwing in the area just now.

However, for me it was the first redwing I have seen since I relocated to the North East nearly eight years ago, so for me a definite landmark that made the whole walk worthwhile.

If I'd actually been looking for Redwing, Chopwell Woods isn't where I would have started.

A Quiet Period

I haven't posted for some time for the simple reason that I haven't been seeing anything I felt worth reporting.

Partly I haven't made the effort.  There have been a few potential sightings at the coast. Having missed them at Seaton Sluice, an increasing number of snow buntings have appeared on the links at Whitley Bay near where I once lived, as have couple of black redstarts at Cullercoats.  But I have seen both species before and the supposed 'rarities' that occasionally turn up were restricted to known occasional visitors (green-winged teal, American wigeon) and for me unexciting seabirds, though I was briefly tempted by a report of some little auk somewhere.

I was keeping an eye out for any waxwings appearing and there were a small number at North Shields last week that were not expected to linger.  It seems too late and too warm to expect a major irruption.

On my travels the most interesting thing I saw was a pair of goosander on the Derwent near Swalwell.

I was however pleased to note last week the return of long-tailed tits on the suet balls I started to put out when the first minor frost appeared.

Some long-tailed tits

More long-tailed tits

It's possible to get seven or so visiting the same feeder.

Today though, they were outdone by an invasion of the more common members of the tit family, which actually continued for perhaps 15 minutes:

Blue, great and coal tits

Tits are almost always the most common visitors to the garden. This seemed to a case of taking advantage of the lull before the latest forecast storm moves in. 

It'll be interesting to see if there are any more rare visitors to the garden over the coming weeks.

An Even Quieter Period

I'm afraid it's gone from not seeing much while out to not being able or wanting to go out because of the weather. I've been keeping an eye open for reports of waxwings and hawfinches but the former have only just started to turn up in small numbers in the last few days and the latter have been restricted to locations further South.

So the focus has again been on the restricted action in the garden.

Last weekend brought some severe frosts and a heavy snowfall followed by an overnight surge in temperature  to 15C!  But the cold weather has at least brought some bird interest and a jay has ventured into the garden a couple of times, very nervily and constantly hopping around the trees at the back fence.

Jay

It was quite lucky to catch it staying still for a couple of instants.

The nuthatch on the other hand has become more confident and quite frequent on the seed feeder.  In fact I should say nuthatches plural, as it one day became apparent that more than one was joining in the fun.

Nuthatches

I wondered about a pair but it looks like they are both males.

I also put out some fat balls for the long-tailed tits but so far no sign of any takers beyond a great tit but something has taken some fair chunks out of them.

One result of the long mild spell has been I suspect an increase in the local mouse population. A somewhat gruesome consequence was that half a dozen have managed to drown themselves in the buckets I use to catch water dropping from the summer house roof.

Not a great way to go...

Home Sweet Home

A curse upon Chopwell Woods!   I keep visiting in the hope that it will produce some reasonable sightings and invariably come back disappointed.

On my last attempt about three weeks back, the main notable event was the almost total flooding of the southern path into the woods from Blackhall Mill. 

I only managed to start the walk at all by scrambling through the puddles next to the bushes and the best thing I actually saw were a few clumps of snowdrops by the River Derwent after getting off the bus.

In spite of wandering around fairly extensively through the western part of the woods, it was pretty much like a desert with hardly a thing to be seen and precious little to be heard - just a couple of blackbirds, the odd pigeon and a few blue tits.

Even when I strayed into Chopwell East Field during a burst of sunlight, the only change was a slight increase in the amount of bird song.  You would usually reckon to see a squirrel or two somewhere, but absolutely zero - just our canine friends and their captive humans.

A couple of bike rides - to Bolam Lake and yesterday to Corbridge produced nothing at all either.

So once again my interest has been tied to what happens in the garden and nearby.

Red kites have been active over the village and on one occasion right over the house as I drove into the front drive.  Coal tits and long-tailed tits have been doing well, the latter being the second most-spotted tit visitor and interestingly both are more prevalent than great tit, which seems to have dropped down the rankings for some reason.  A pair of blue tits inspected the nesting box, but as in previous years, did not pursue their interest.

Robins have visited frequently and I noted that two of them were untypically tolerant of each others' presence.  Then it became apparent that some mating behaviour was starting and one day I suddenly spotted THREE robins on the gravel within an area just one metre square - but of course it only lasted a couple of seconds or so.

As well as the regular dunnocks, a wren has been seen twice. 

Marsh tits have been past occasional visitors - meaning literally once or twice a year - but last week one actually turned up on three days out of four.  After several attempts when it proved nervy, |I finally managed to get a reasonable photo of it on its last visit.

Marsh Tit

It hasn't been seen since, but of course that doesn't mean it hasn't been back.

Overall though, my campaign to up the level of bird sightings this winter hasn't been a great success and I'm now looking forward to the return of butterflies and bees over the coming weeks.

Which reminds me that at by this time last year, I had already seen my first red admiral.  What a difference a year makes!

Flies and Butterflies

I noted with interest that the Big Butterfly Count has recorded an overall increase in sightings this year.  The reckoning is that the rainy spring was good for caterpillars.  Whilst I can't dispute this I still think that early-emerging species suffered.  While the multi-brooded speckled wood recovered after a slow start, I think the orange tip had a bad year.  It doesn't feature in the Count as it's no longer on the wing in mid-July.  Green-veined white numbers are confirmed down and it seemed to me that it had a short good spell at the end of July but wasn't seen much before that.  Small white was more considerably outvoted by large white here than generally.

The buddleia is now fading fast and it's a race to the bottom for the last garden sighting.  This week there has just been the odd individual red admiral and just one small tortoiseshell and yesterday I felt lucky to capture red admiral and large white (plus a few flies) together.  There had also been a speckled wood moments before.

Red Admiral with Large White

Meanwhile the holly blue count is up to 13, but none in the last few days.

It has been flies rather than bees that have caught my attention lately, causing a bit of a problem as I'm only at the guessing game stage when it comes to identifying them.

for example last week I discovered a spider (absolutely no attempt at identification!) about to devour this rather hairy orange fly.

Spider with Fly

It appears the fly maybe a yellow dung fly, which immediately reduced any sympathy I may have felt for it.

You may also observed another wee fly with an orange abdomen on the butterfly snap above.  I encountered this one again the other day, and it seems to roughly fit the description of the common orange legionnaire.

Common Orange Legionnaire?

Well not so common to me as I can't remember seeing them before.

Lastly  i topped up the bird nuts a bit today and was quickly visited by a another nuthatch, this time a male.

Nuthatch with Great Tit and Blue Tit

I'm keeping my eye out for ivy coming into flower in the hope of nectaring butterflies or an ivy bee, but it's early days yet.

Exciting Springtime Sightings

 Starting with a bit of bad news, I found this dead great tit in the garden last week.  

Great Tit

I sort of assumed that it had crashed into the summerhouse, but on inspection it seemed to have a wound on its upper breast so maybe got nobbled by something.

Yesterday, I went on the first big trip of the year with son and fiancee to Leighton Moss, which provided a sufficient parade of sightings to justify even the £9 entry fee for non-RSPB members.

We saw a good number of marsh harriers flying at considerable height, which surprised me a bit.  On previous occasions in the Netherlands and at Leighton Moss before, I'd been used to seeing them flying low looking for prey.  Often they were in groups of two or more so I supposed that it was some sort of pre-mating routine, disturbed by occasional buzzards.  Anyway, I was delighted to get a photo of one in flight with my pocket camera, even though it wasn't brilliant.

Although we didn't manage to see one, we did hear numerous bitterns booming, which was a first time for me.  I must say 'booming' is a bit of a misnomer.  As one of the signs pointed out, it sounds much more like someone blowing over the top of an old-fashioned glass milk bottle.

Also not seen was the bearded tit.  We hadn't really expected them to show at this time of year although apparently they are still around.

One bird that is present is the ring-necked duck and I thought I might have seen one at distance from the tower.  In fact it proved to be just another tufted duck.

Shortly afterwards, heading for lunch I spotted some small red fungi next to the path.  I think they are called scarlet elf cups.

At the last hide we visited there was a view over several bits of land sticking out into the water, surrounded by various ducks.  A group of twitchers reckoned there was a water pipit working its way along one of them.  Unfortunately, try as we might, we couldn't confirm or deny it as a sighting as the photos we took of the wee bird were all too blurry.  Apparently it had been identified earlier by someone using a powerful telescope, so presumably correctly.

Overall, there were just too many photos to post individually, so I've amalgamated them together in  brief video.  Unfortunately there is no background music as that now costs extra from Microsoft!

Festive Famine

Not much to report over the Christmas period…

Having told someone I don’t see any chaffinches in my garden, one typically turned up two days later and another, a female was in the plum tree on New Year’s Day.

I spent Christmas at my son’s, where a damaged fence has been caused by a badger breaking into their garden to get at the bird food, exciting much interest from their cats. We did a short walk up Galahill where I briefly spotted a flock of bullfinches, otherwise there were several woodpigeons. 

Last Wednesday, I did a seasonal self-guided walk at Weetslade Country Park, which was quite interesting as it covers a far larger area than you see from the cycle track. We got a good view of a kestrel hovering but a visit to the bird feeder area was disappointing as the feeders were all virtually empty. You’d have thought they’d have filled them especially.

However we did get a nice view of a little egret on one of the wee ponds.

Little Egret

Later it proved there was a pair of them. There is now a nature conservation area and it is apparently possible to find otters and water voles.

The garden has continued to be a haven for tits of all four main varieties when the jackdaws aren’t around, with occasional robins, blackbirds and dunnocks.

Tits

In fact I’ve now run out of bird nuts, so quickly have they been disappearing.

A pause in the action...

I'm not too sure why but I've seen remarkably little of note recently.  Perhaps the mild weather has meant that local birds are still finding plenty of food without visiting my garden.  Also I'm maybe just not so tuned in to looking out for birds above as more in the habit of looking down for bees and butterflies.  That's not to say there aren't plenty of interesting visitors stopping off on the Northumberland coast and makes me think that I must time my visit to Holy Island a little later next year.

Having failed in an attempt to see the subalpine warbler at Tynemouth on a bike ride two weeks ago, I thought things would change in the garden when I started putting out suet balls again but there was virtually no response when I hung them in the same location as last year.  Even yesterday I noted there were still a couple of bees around but various attempts to find an ivy bee have failed and only produced wasps.

One more promising note is that, for the first time in a while, I have seen an occasional coal tit coming to the feeders, and a robin has started to investigate the suet balls.  Otherwise it's been hedge-to-hedge jackdaws with the occasional blue tit, great tit or dunnock.

A brief walk at Chopwell Woods two days ago produced the usual - i.e. virtually nothing heard or seen apart from three grey squirrels.  

I had been lined up to go on a U3A visit to St Mary's Island today but had to cancel because of a domestic issue.

Slightly better was a bike ride yesterday.  Having got to Hexham without finding in the countryside except a rabbit and a big roost of chaffinches near the Tyne, I decided on a detour via Whittle Dene Lakes on the way home.  Here, alarmingly, two waters were closed because of blue algae, which seems remarkably late in the year.  However, there were a few cormorants, a single lapwing in flight and a kestrel hunting as well as a few canada geese and tufted ducks.

Unfortunately none of these resulted in a successful photo.

Which reminds me that I did very nearly get a good picture of a young kestrel perching in a nearby tree  last Tuesday - until it saw me! 

Tuesday 22nd December

It continues to be a period when I'm seeing more activity in the garden than on my trips out.

A trip to Holywell Dene only revealed a few tits and a walk at Wallington Hall some more tits and a single nuthatch.

Long-tailed tit

However my garden nuthatch still visits the bird table often, and several long-tailed tits often appear though generally just for short raids.  Coal tits are still the most frequent visitors, ahead of blue and great tit and the larger birds.  Wren, dunnock and blackbird have all turned up plus the 'not quite right' greenfinch (see previous two posts).  The long-tailed tits have started feeding a good deal on the fatballs, which have been neglected right through the autumn period for whatever reason unless I had removed them from the feeder and put them somewhere else.

There has also been a surprising first - a goldfinch.  Although common locally, I've never seen one in the garden before.  Overall, it seems the shorter days and the need to feed intensively around the middle of the day is the main cause of the increased traffic.  

On Saturday I did take a trip to Swinsty Loch in North Yorkshire for a socially-distanced walk with daughter and fiancé with slightly better results, starting with a good view of a red kite over the village as I set off.

The walk around Swinsty Loch is advertised as a gentle stroll on a gravel path.  Unfortunately the youngsters had decided instead on a hike through the moors to Badger Dyke Loch, which unbenown to them proved to be a tour of the local swamp grounds and quite hard on both lungs and legs.

However we did happen on this couple of peacocks on the way.

Peacocks

They were wise to shelter in the little hollow as a full-scale pheasant shoot was underway at Badger Dyke Loch.  Apart from dead pheasants we managed to see several score of wigeon at the peaceful end of the water and a handful of tufted duck on the way back down the other side.  In the fields a few fieldfare and redwing were around without showing too well.

To be honest I was slightly disapponted by the wigeon as I had thought I had spotted some pochard in the group.  At least I felt well-exercised and wholly justified in not doing any exercises at home the day after.

Tuesday 6th August

The garden has been a little more interesting over the past fortnight.

The tactic of restricting the supply of bird food does seem to be paying off slowly and the feeders have frequently been visited by  blue tits, great tits and coal tits, often with six or eight birds present at a time.  Some are even prepared to chance their luck when I am sitting on the decking about five foot away.

Peacock

A completely chance sighting was, with reasonable certainty a holly blue butterfly that passed over the garden without visiting.  The buddleia I rescued when it was blown over in early spring has survived and produced its first butterfly two days ago, a good looking peacock and there have been numerous small whites, the odd large white and two green-veined white.  Speckled wood and painted lady have appeared on occasions and a single, battered meadow brown landed on the fir hedge at one point.

The peacock was the first I have seen here since the spring but there were some when I visited Dumfries at the end of July, along with several painted ladies, small tortoiseshells and a few red admirals.  I also saw the same orange-bordered moth in the town centre I struggled to identify a couple of weeks back.

Apart from seeing a nice bullfinch cycling back from Gosforth, the last couple of weekends have been devoted to social activities, but a spontaeneous visit to Cherryburn House produced a good number of painted ladies (definitely a painted lady year!), small tortoiseshells, peacocks, meadow browns, a couple of commas and red admirals and a single small skipper, not very clearly marked.  I wished I'd taken a count and made a second submission to the Big Butterfly Count - especially as the forecast for the coming week looks distinctly bleak.

Saturday 22nd June

Baby blue tits and some baby great tits have been dominating the scene in the garden, with occasional visits from woodpeckers of either gender and a greenfinch again visiting the niger seed feeder.

There hasn't been a reappearance of the marsh tits since the heavy rain last week.  I coudn't replace the fatballs they seem to like and the ones I did use were of superior quality, attracting bigger numbers.  I sense

Red Admiral on horse dung

that one or both of these factors have put the marsh tits off for the time being.

On Monday I took a long bike ride to Fenwick Pit via Ponteland and back via Percy Main.  Red admirals appeared at various points on the route, though never more than two at once.  There were no peacocks though, reinforcing my developing idea that a good year for one might be less good for the other.

At Fenwick Pit itself there was a very large painted lady and five more to my surprise by the track just North of the Shiremoor bypass.

Painted Lady at Fenwick Pit

Yesterday I took my first trip to the Havannah Nature Reserve since visiting the former drift mine there in 1974.  I immediately took to it, liking the variety of paths it is possible to follow through woods and undergrowth and the level of management which ensured both tidiness and strong vegetation. 

I don't know if it is something to do with the proximity to the airport but birds there seem to be quite tame.  Even though there are no feeders I spotted two willow (presumably) tits moving through the bushes, as well as a blackcap, a couple of willow warblers, a pair of bullfinches and a few long-tailed tits.

My main purpose in visiting was to see where reports of purple hairstreak sightings last year may exactly have come from.  Although there were relatively few mature oak trees, there are a number of immature ones so I still wasn't sure where to look when I come back.

There were however a couple of great areas for butterflies and I saw 15 speckled wood, 10 small heath and, interestingly, another seven painted ladies that were equally as large as the ones I saw on Monday.  I suppose that the size - positively massive compared to the ones I saw in Cyprus in April - suggests that they have overwintered but maybe it will be a painted lady summer. Also spotted were two large whites, one green-veined white and a single red admiral.

Small Heath

Speckled Wood

Although I scanned the heathland area quite carefully, meadow brown and dingy skipper were not seen.  Neither was common blue, in spite of an abundance of bird's foot trefoil.

One nice surprise near a ditch was a large brown dragonfly, which I have proudly identified as a male four-spotted chaser.

Four-spotted Chaser

Friday 14th June

Large White

Last Sunday I decided on an ultra slow bike ride along the Tyne focussing on a bit of grassland heath near Newburn.  The idea was hopefully to see some small heaths and small coppers before the fine weather disappeared. It was a total failure as, apart from a quick flash of a speckled wood while careering downhill from Greenside, no brown butterfly was seen.  This is a bit concerning as over 100 small heaths were seen in the area at the same time last year, and seems to indicate that the wet and cool weather this summer so far is
going to mean a bad year for butterflies.

All I saw by the river was a few isolated whites and the only pleasing thing was that one of them settled and could be identified as a large white.  This time there were no orange
tips.

Things have been much more interesting in the garden and, after a few fleeting sightings, marsh tits have started to visit the feeders in groups. One one occasion I was able to watch them from about three yards away while pulling twitch grass out of the lawn..  This more than confirms the confident but brief sightings I reported last year.

Marsh Tits

It is also the season for baby birds.  Blue tits and on one occasion great tits have chosen my plum tree as a feeding station for their young. There seems to be a very healthy hatch of blue tits. Some have learned to take from the peanut feeder but one in particular found it hard to hang on to and fell straight off.

Baby Blue Tits

The jackdaws I thought were nesting next door have clearly been successful and there is now the interesting spectacle of a couple of juvenile jackdaws playing games around the decking.  Apart from chasing each other round in a form of musical patio furniture, they are compulsively trying to pick things up and wonder off with them.  A particular favourite is a fallen foxglove flower, which then gets dragged around to no evident purpose.

Juvenile Jackdaws

Wednesday 28th January

Some rather mixed recent weather and a need to address my increasing post-Christmas weight have limited my recent excursions.

I rode to Newcastle by bike on Saturday for non-nature reasons but encountered a group of twitchers on the Tyne at Blaydon, one of whom amusingly said they were trying to change a chaffinch into a brambling.  I understood - bramblings are like that.

On the way back I cycled up the hill from Rowland's Gill and saw a series of five low-flying red kites between the town centre and Highfield.  In between there was a brief sighting of a seagull pursuing a much smaller finch-sized bird. Not something that normally occurs but I supposed it was a dispute over a garden titbit.

On Sunday morning I attempted to take part in the Great British Garden Birdwatch.  Gale force winds meant that I spent most of my time twiddling my thumbs and produced a not particularly typical final count of six jackdaw, two magpies, one wood pigeon and one blue tit apart from four unidentifiable seagulls flying high above.

Typically of course a posse of long-tailed titis turned up towards dusk and this morning blue tit, great tit and coal tit all visited the bird table that yesterday had largely been ignored.

Today the red kites were back in evidence again at Rowland's Gill.  I had a few minutes to spare at the viaduct when one hovered low overhead offering good views. The resulting mobile phone footage gives an impression of greater distance but it was pleasing when another bird joined in.

A male and a female perhaps?

There was another guy on the viaduct who told me that there were only 36 red kites in the area, but I think that would have been the original release number.  Presumably they will have bred.

Monday 16th April

I have now been installed in my new home for three weeks and have been keeping a keen eye out to see what turned up in the garden, which is a good deal more rural than the one I had in Dumfries.

I put some fatballs out in a feeder at an early stage and attracted all three common tits, a couple of robins and a blackbird that managed to get its head through the outer cage.

Once unpacked, I started putting food out on the bird table, which attracted more or less the same plus a regular dunnock, a wood pigeon and a magpie.

Log-tailed tits

On going for a walk around the area, I saw a couple of red kites circling and on a bike ride to Newcastle, I saw a grey squirel run across the road and heard a skylark above the hills and a chiffchaff next to the Tyne near Newburn.

More recently I acquired a caged peanut feeder and, gratifyingly,  the first observed visitors were a pair of long-tailed tits that were not part of a larger flock.  Then a jackdaw turned up.

It seemed to me that the bird table was emptying rather quickly and after a couple of days, the peanut feeder was lying on the path spilling its contents, so it was getting clear that there was an intruder of some kind.  Something was also splitting open the striped sunflower seeds on the bird table and leaving the husks around.

I suspected Squireel Nutkin and was not surprised when one turned up digging in one of my pots before surrying off at speed.  The day after it turned up again, shimmied up the stem of the bird feeder and scoffed most of the food. Mystery solved!

That's where all the bird food went!

The day after I saw a red kite quite clearly from my kitchen window.  I think they like to circle over Garesfield Golf Club, which is nearby.

So far I have seen one or two bumble bees and a moth but no butterflies, though one or two small tortoiseshells have been reported on nature websites.

Saturday 17th February

A wren appeared in the garden one morning as I was getting up.  Perhaps it is coming regularly.

The weather put paid to even a short bike ride on Wednesday, so the day after I took a trip to Threave Castle as I've seen hen harriers there at this time of year.

On the path to the castle there were two great tits obviously hanging around for any titbits of food, just like the robin on one of my previous visits.  I had really meant to keep my eyes open for willow tits on the way to Stepping Stones Hide but sort of forgot.  I visited the hide briefly as a large flock of geese gradually circled in to land on the other side of the river, just mear enough to see through binoculars that they were pink-footed geese.  I've seen a lot of them this year.

Leaving the hide I noticed a single goldeneye being propelled downriver by a flood tide but still managing to dive for food.

There wasn't much going on as I made my way up the river, having stopped for a brief look at the new and old osprey nest sites.  But there was a small flock of long-tailed tits passing through the trees on the way up to the other hides.  I would like to get a snap of one some day but, as usual, they moved on fairly smartly.

The slim pickings continued during three-quarters of an hour spent in the lower hide.  As I half suspected, the nearest part of the marshy grassland was extensively flooded, which I think decreased the likelihood of harriers passing by.

A buzzard or two flew past and a red kite wheeled around for a bit a good way off.  In the far distance it was just about possible to distinguish some wigeon on the deeper water, but otherwise all was quiet.

All quiet from the hide - apart from a single swan

A nice little foray nonethless.  On the way back to the car, there were a couple of roe deer hanging around the edge of a field for quite some time.

Thursday 28th December

A long lapse has been brought on by an outburst of househunting and so no nature activity.  The one thing I did notice was a casual visit to the garden by a wren.  I'm sure this must have happened before at some point but I can't remember the last time I saw one there.

But yesterday I needed to get some fresh air after Christmas and set off to Mersehead following a couple of reports of bramblings in the area, notably on the feeders at the Visitor's Centre which seemed a good idea on a chilly day.

Greenfinches

I duly arrived and found a profusion of birds around the feeders, the first being a yellowhammer that was not to reappear later.  It was nice to see a couple of tree sparrows quite quickly too. The low, bright sunlight made it difficult to see colour and I at first thought there were some bright, small birds that might be of some note. The photos showed some birds obviously had a yellowish tinge and on finally using the binoculars I could see that they were female greenfinches and almost all the others were tree sparrows.

This was in itself interesting as I would never have expected the scene to be dominated by these two species and have never seen either bird in such large numbers.  There were some tits, dunnocks and blackbirds plus a fair few chaffinches but at times every second bird was a tree sparrow or a greenfinch.  It also seemed to me that the female greenfinches were a bit smaller than the males, something I hadn't observed before.

Meanwhile I scanned the chaffinches for anything that looked a bit different, i.e. a brambling but no brambling did appear.

After some time I set off for a wander towards the hides.  Apart from the barnacles, various flocks of which were honking all around the pace, there was a big cluster of birds motionless in one of the bushes on the path to Bruaich Hide.

Linnet

Again the light was difficult but I took them to be linnets.  They sat motionless as I gradually approached as if saving their energy on such a cold day.  In the end they did reluctantly fly off apart from one, presumably their PR Officer who stayed on his/her perch and allowed me to get a close up. 

Apart from that there was precious little to be sighted in the distance on the wetlands and I was having a bit of trouble focussing my binoculars, which got steamed up with the change of temperature on leaving the visitor's centre.

So I decided on a yomp across the beach before returning to the feeders just before dusk.  It was all very enjoyable in the sunshine, very still and quiet but again nothing to be seen (apart from a single heron over the wetland).  The reason in my view was that the tide was extremely far out, and so all the waders, birds of prey etc. move out with it.

Mersehead - very pretty, but no birds in sight!

At the end of the day I spent a good hour watching the feeders until the sun started to disappear.  Still no brambling...

Sunday 3rd May

Quite a busy week but one interspersed with interesting sightings.

Had to take new bike for service at Castle Douglas on Thursday, so wasn't much focussed on checking the surroundings on the way there.  There were the usual goldfinches and the odd skylark and after appropriate research I was able to confirm that the wagtails along the military road were not white but pied - today anyway.

Nuthatch seeks Peanut

With a little more time on the way back, decided to break at the place on the way up to the Glenkilns where the birdboxes are.  I mentioned in a previous post that I thought them too low.  As you can see however, it transpires they were probably not for nesting at all.  Someone had filled one of them with peanuts and this nuthatch took full advantage by raiding it repeatedly (see photo).  Several other tits and a tree creeper were also lurking with intent, but only one great tit was bold enough to steal a nut while I was around.

Moving on over the moors, there were a number of meadow pipits playing around on the walls and fences, probably in mating mode, and a fleeting hare, but no wheatears.

A pleasant surprise was to see that the sand martins have returned to their nesting haunt on the Nith just south of the cycle path.  It was a surprise because there was no sign of them when I rode through at 8.00 a.m.  However there were far more on the Wear at Chester-le-Street on Friday when Hilary and I paused during a househunting trip on my behalf.  We also fitted in a quick walk round Seghill Nature Reserve on Saturday where there were a few swallows and big numbers of skylarks, some at quite close quarters.

Wednesday 4th March

A pleasant day and resulting enjoyable bike ride to Haugh of Urr, but not much to report on the wildlife front.  The standard birds of prey (buzzard, red kite) were in evidence, though not as much as last week and just before Crocketford there was a good sighting of a male kestrel that wheeled back around me and settled in a tree behind a wall.  I tried to sneak up unobserved to see if I could get a photograph but it must have detected my presence as it had moved on back down the road.  A march hare also ran away from me for about three hundred yards across a farm field between Crocketford and the military road.

The main event of the day was seeing the first squirrel of the spring, which ambled across the road on the hill after Bogle Bridge.  So I stopped at the point where I had found a lot of squirrels feeding on seed left for them on the wall.  This time there were no further squirrels, but several blue tits and great tits turned up in nearby trees as if expecting some sort of action.  I also noticed several nesting boxes of the sort often favoured by pied flycatchers nailed to the beech trees, but it seemed to me they were placed far too low and in easy reach of various predators.

15th February

Eskrigg Nature Reserve, Lockerbie for first visit.  Nice walks, lake area heavily doctored by human hand and large supply of nuts and bird food around main hut.  Big flocks of chaffinches and siskins. Also all three tits, brambling, goldfinch, nuthatch, gs woodpecker.  Occasionally scattered by passing raptor (not seen).

Very little to see or hear away from this area.

A week ago there was also a female siskin in the garden, on nuts in the pear tree.  First and probably last this winter - few conifers in garden these days