Wednesday 13 January 2010

Garden 12th & Alders Lake 13th January




Yesterday was a stay indoors day for a change. The only time I ventured out was to refill the feeders and put a few scraps out and it wasn't long before the black headed gulls spotted them and eventually plucked up the courage to land and have their fill before the magpies stashed it all away like the fox does. There were two common gulls among them again today but frustratingly they declined to drop in for a photo call. The three pictures below were all taken in the garden yesterday through (not very clean) patio doors. That'll be another job when the thaw comes.



BLACK HEADED GULL






DUNNOCK








FEMALE BLACKBIRD




Today I took a short walk down to the Alders lakes to check out the coots and make sure no more had come to a sticky end, thankfully all seemed OK, there were still just the seven dead birds on the edge of the ice where I saw them a couple of days ago. When the thaw comes I will try to fish one out if I can and try to find out if they were shot although i'm sure they were. While I was there I crossed over Old Lunsford Lane, carefully checking the stream for jack snipe as there was one found here on 7th January last year, then walked into the small wooded area just inside the country park near to the car park. This is quite a good place to see treecreepers, I stood quietly for a couple of minutes and eventually heard one calling close by but unfortunately a couple of dogs appeared, as usual completely in control of their master and doing whatever they pleased, so I headed grumpily for home without seeing it.








3 comments:

Ken. said...

Hi Phil. Hopefully you will be able to get hold of one of the dead Coot's then the lake thaws out, like you said,and find out what happened. If they was shot it just shows what brainless morons there are around.
Nice to have a Fox visiting. We have one, except ours doesn't turn up until around 1 am.
Your New Hythe tally is coming along.

Phil said...

The list is coming along Ken but it's all uphill now for a while until spring and we get some summer migrants, although I did get house sparrow today down Alders which I forgot to mention on the blog.
Phil

Warren Baker said...

Hi Phil,
Just looking at your year list. There are 19 species on there that I have not seen here, and some of those I never will!