Another waxwing over the garden calling this morning

With the still freezing conditions we have missed out on another weeks ringing session and my nets in the garden are still frozen. The way things are going, we may not get much more in before the end of the year.

Decided to head out the Burnham Norton/Brancater Staithe area yesterday to see what was about. Wasn't really expecting much but you never know what may be out there. I walked from Burnham Norton along the field margins to Brancaster Staithe and then back along the seawall. The fields inland had loads on pinkies and they spent most of their time being disturbed and flying to and from the marshes. Apart from that the fields were quiet.

The walk along the seawall was better and there were loads of waders feeding in the flooded fields. There has been a lot of habitat improvements going on here and at the moment it looks cracking. Lots of splashy pools and grazed grassland. Looks good for breeding waders next spring. Most of the birds were lapwing and golden plover but I was surprised to see over 250 dunlin also. There were smaller numbers of ruff, redshank and snipe along with 3 black-tailed godwits.

Further towards Burnham Norton there was a big group of wigeon, probably 3000+ and a selection of geese including 18 barnacles. On Burnham Norton marshes itself there wea a family party of 3 pale-bellied brent geese, water pipit and a dodgy, although nice looking, bar-headed goose!

Raptors were the stand-out group with rough-legged buzzard, 2 merlin, peregrine, 5+marsh harrier, kestrel, sparrowhawk and 2 barn owls seen.

Wigeon at Burnham Norton

Flushed a snipe out of the garden on Saturday morning while filling my feeders. It looked like it had been feeding under one of the larger bushes! Species 85 for the list

Fu*king blog!!! Just spent nearly an hour writing a nice account of my day and it has decided to delete the lot. For those of you who will say 'well you should have saved it', I did the only problem was that it deleted the text it also autosaved so I could go back to the saved piece.

Instead of a long rambling entry, I am just posting the images.

Waxwings in Titchwell village

Coues arctic redpoll (right bird) at Wells Woods

Female Northern bullfinch in Wells Woods

Humes yellow-browed warbler in Wells Woods.

Had a garden tick this morning in the rather surprising form of 2 Bewick's swans (84). They came out of the mist and headed west over the garden. Not much else about despite the snow and cold temperatures.

With our first snow on the ground this morning I decided not to join all the idiots on the road and go out for a walk locally. There is a good circular walk that follows the roads between here and the Creakes where there is lots of good looking habitat. Many of the fields have game covers and there are lots of small pockets of woodland. It looks good for thrushes, finches and raptors.

It was quiet to start with and at the first farm where there are sometimes tree sparrows, they were working and nothing was there. It felt quiet so I was surprised (but not unexpected) when 13 waxwings flew overhead. I managed to see the perched in a hedge but they soon flew north. More unexpected was 2 lapland buntings overhead with a small flock of skylarks. On the 'inward' leg of the walk I found a large stubble field with over 200 skylarks but unfortunatly you could only see them in flight so anything could be hiding amongst them. 8 tree sparrows not far from home would have made a nice addition to the garden list.

With the roads clearing and the prospect of poor weather over the next few days, I decided to head to Thornham to look for the Northern harrier. As I arrived the bird was distantly hunting around the Thornham Point bushes with a couple of marsh harriers and a buzzard. The viewing was cut short by the arrival of a snow storm so I headed home.

Parrinder hide in the snow and a blizzard

The record has fallen!!!

While talking to some visitors on the main path this morning, something caught my eye over the reedbed. It turned out to be a cracking rough-legged buzzard (207) being mobbed by a couple of marsh harriers. Unfortunatly I didn't have my radio on me as as I tried to get my mobile out to phone the office I lost the bird. A few people were now stopping and after about 10mins I spotted the bird heading west towards Thornham with a marsh harrier still in pursuit.
A couple of the people asked what other interesting birds were around. I said that there were lots of marsh harriers about and looked through my bins. I said that I had 4 in the same view when I realised that the closer one was a hen harrier. They were very pleased as they hadn't seen one before. I then realised that it was the probable Northern harrier and managed to get good scope views as it hunted over the reedbed for about 10mins.
This was the first time I have seen it for a couple of weeks and with all the info now on the net, I was able to study it a bit more. The primary pattern is smoething that can only be done from photos but I did the narrow dark bars that run along the underwing coverts to add to the heavily streaked head and orangy, unstreaked underparts. The bird headed off inland but was seen again later in the afternoon.

Seen to be doing well for waxwings again at the moment. As I was driving through Docking this morning, I noticed a bird flying ahead. I was sure it was a waxwing and managed to pull over. As I opened the door I could hear it calling and got my bins on it.

Pretty good day today.

Started with 9 waxwings over the garden as I was leaving for work so I decided to drive around the estate to look for them. Found 5 in some trees near the house but a sparrowhawk went through and they buggered off.

A radio message of a 'white redpoll' feeding with the twite on the brackish marsh got our attention so Rob and I headed down to check it out. As soon as we arrived the bird was showing and even with the naked eye it looked very pale. Our initial thoughts were that is could be an arctic redpoll and that we need to get some photos. The bird was very pale with a pink flush to the breast. However, as we watched the bird we were then unsure of it's ID but 'put it out' as a possible arcitc. There were a couple of things that didn't seen right, especially the rump. Arcitc redpolls should have a large white unstreaked rump and only light flank streaking. This bird had dark uppertail coverts, the lower rump was pink and unstreaked but the upper rump had fine streaking. After sending the photos to someone for advice, we changed the ID to a male mealy

redpoll although a very pale one. As someone I know once said...'it's an educational bird!'

3 barn owls on the way home was nice