The weather this week has almost been the same everyday. Cloudy and a bit grim in the morning, then gradually getting sunnier throughout the day. I've been lucky enough to spend every day outside which is really nice.
On monday , following reports of several Rough Legged Buzzards around Nottingham, I decided that i'd go to Gedling Pit Top to see if there were any there, as reported. Sadly there were no rough-legs, although some close scrutiny on a common buzzard revealed it to be quite pale, but a common nonetheless! It was really quite wonderful on the top of the pit though, with the sun shining and countless skylarks singing from all directions, and showing quite well as they sang so low down. Several Meadow Pipit, my first of the year, and a number of displaying Lapwing, made it worthwhile visiting this site. A single Teal was also noted on one of the ponds at the bottom of the site.
On tuesday i visited a very similar habitat, Annesley Pit, or Bentinck Void, or Bogs Farm Quarry. Its hard to tell which was which, as i'm very unfamiliar with the area. Much the same birdlife was noted, with more skylarks and meadow pipits enjoying this type of terrain, much as they do across similar nsites in the county. Another couple of buzzards were seen, and again scrutinised (damn variable birds!), resulting in them being Common Buzzards once again. There are some large waterbodies at the bottom of the pit which were being used by a variety of waterfowl, including a couple of Pochard, a Little Grebe and several other species. The highlight of the day however was hearing my first singing Chiffchaff of 2012, always a wonderful start to the warmer months, letting us know that spring has arrived. I was thinking i may see some migrants this week, but was rather expecting Sand martin to be first, as it was the year before, but no the chiffchaff took the glory this year and a whole 9 days earlier than . Several butterflies were also noted, also my first of the spring, a red admiral and some small tortoiseshells.
Today i was out at Besthorpe again and the day didn't begin promisingly, as there was a thick blanket of fog across the county, and at the reserve the visibility was terrible. However as the day wore on, the sun broke through and the fog dissipated. There were loads of birds about today, including 20 Shelduck (looks like it could be a good year for them here) and quite alot more waterfowl. The poor visibility, mixed with a lack of bins when observing them, made me think i'd seen some little ringed plovers, as a few little birds were zipping about on some of the scrapes. However, once i got some bins on them when the fog had lifted they turned out to be Pied Wagtails (!). In the late afternoon a noisy oystercatcher flew high over to the north, and about an hour later another 3 landed on one of the islands, piping away. It looked like a pair which were dealing with an interloper, and the single bird soon got chased off and the other 2 quietened down. A Little Egret was noted, the first one i've seen here for a while, and the heronry and cormorant colony seemed to be taking shape with lots of noise and nest building activity in evidence.
Passerines were well represented too, again with Skylarks taking centre stage, providing a backing track for the entire day. Several meadow pipits flew over, and on the newly ploughed land on the north bank of Mons Pool, there were up to around 30 Reed Bunting, obviously finding something to snack on. Small flocks of fieldfare and redwing were passing west all day, but there were some flocks of near to 100 birds at times - there's not going to be long before these winter visitors are a distant memory, until they reappear to cause excitement once again when the autumn arrives.
As i said before, Besthorpe is an exciting reserve at the moment, as it is developing into a more mature site. The amount of birds being seen and the diversity of species show that it has some potential, so hopefully the rest of the year will bring some interesting sightings.
Off to attenborough tomorrow :)
No comments:
Post a Comment