Turdus

that is thrushes to everyone else!

The common 4 species (blackbird, song thrush, redwing and fieldfare) are usually easy to pick up on a yearlist but the other two (mistle thrush and ring ouzel) are much harder. Despite being locally common, it is amazing how difficult it is to catch up with mistle thruhes but this year I have already managed to bag one flying over the capark earlier in the week. Ouzels are even harder to get and I don't think that I saw one last year. Having said that there is a nice female wintering at one of our ringing sites at the moment which I caught uo with this morning.

Picked up the debatable wildfowl on our WeBS count yesterday morning. A pair of red crested pochard (returning?) turned up on the fresh marsh on Friday and I finally saw the wintering female manarin. 10 cranes (8 and 2) have been through this week but despite missing them there should be plenty of chance in the spring, the traditional time for the Broads birds to be on the move.

Despite a morning temperature of -4, the conditions have finally been good enough for opening the nets in the garden, overcast and more inmportantly no wind!. I have now got a 40ft to add to my existing two which now gives me greater coverage. A few hours produced 24 new birds, 2 re-traps an a control goldfinch from somewhere else.