Snow days

It's been a bit wintery this week.

I managed a midweek excursion to the patch on Wednesday (one benefit of working at home), frosty ground made it an ideal day to walk through the fields towards the Preceptory and back via High Chibburn and Druridge Farm.

A song thrush was on the path towards the hides and the usual selection of duck were on the big pool which remained unfrozen. Towards the Preceptory a handful of lapwing and golden plover were feeding in the pasture field - they sat tight as a peregrine passed over heading north, it was high so they probably did the right thing.

Down to the farm and a large flock of about 25 chaffinches where in the small copse with three coal tits - it's so unusual to see coal tits at this time of year at Druridge, they are normally just an autumn bird.

One of the coal tits at the farm

House sparrows and skemmie pigeons were numerous around the farm buildings but I was hoping for yellowhammers - I was out of luck there. Stock doves were notable in the fields as I returned along the road to Druridge and a large female sparrowhawk flew past me and landed on the fence.

In the hawthorns a robin sat out - my first of the year.

Robin in the hawthorns

On Saturday Janet joined me and we walked the same route - only this time there was snow underfoot and all around us - the song thrushes on the track had multiplied to four.

Snowy track to the hides where song thrushes flew

The field that held the goldies now had over 70 curlew feeding with a few lapwing, goldies and black-headed gulls for company, with a couple of hundred starling.

As we walked to the farm, two skylark flew up calling, 'the cold weather has brought them in' I said to Janet.

snowy track

frozen fields with a flock of pink-feet flying over

Ten tree sparrows were flitting about the farm with the chaffinches and house sparrows and as we approached the cottages two fieldfare flew over the fields - another bird of hard weather.

In front of Druridge Farm at least 800 pink-footed geese grazed, a single greylag was the only exception. We cut through to the beach hoping for snow buntings which we didn't see but we did see five meadow pipits in the dunes - another species brought in by the cold.

With no home-working this week, it will be the weekend before I am back.. but the evenings are getting lighter now and some post-work birding isn't far off.

Nice to be back

I was so pleased to get out and go birding today, having fought my way to work and back every day and stuck at home all last weekend it was great to be back on the patch. What made it even better? Quality winter birding!

Cold

To kick off - lots of geese between Druridge and Hemscotthill, approaching 1000 pink-foots with nine pale-bellied brents in with them. I didn't get the scope for out for fear of scaring them, so I didn't get a chance to grill them for any other species.

Pink-footed geese near Druridge Hamlet

I had a good walk around the patch, the most obvious and amazing thing was the number of woodcocks, they were everywhere! I din't need to walk through the bushes, there were four in the willows by the Budge screen, twelve in the pine plantation by the entrance, four in the scabby blackthorns at he north end and even one in the mugwort valley of death. There was shooting going on in the surrounding shelterbelts all day - I wonder if it was woodcock they were after?


The only woodcock  curlew photo I managed to get - I think a fox may have got it first

 Whilst looking for woodcocks to photograph, I saw a stoat prancing about after something, no photo's sadly but great to watch.

The big pool had lots of wildfowl on it, nothing unusual, just common winter ducks, wigeon was the most numerous at 250.

Winter wildfowl on the big pool

There were lots of small birds on the move too. A flock of 50 or so skylarks were put up by a sparrowhawk, 60 twite where in the dunes to the north, two flocks of long-tailed tit and a flock of 55 goldfinch were roving about.

goldcrest on teasel

Nothing of note on the beach other than this gruesome dead grey seal minus its eyes and a peregrine over the dunes.

Not looking good.....

At High Chibburn Farm an incredible 29 yellowhammers were keeping their feet warm on top of the cowsheds and 20 or so skylark fed on spilled grain by the barn.

One of 29 yellowhammer son the roof of the barn at High Chibburn Farm

So not a bad days winter birding - 51 species without even trying.

Service - Second to none

WOW - I am so impressed!

In this age of internet shopping and especially my recent dealings with courier firms, I thought the days of good, even bog-standard, customer service were over.

They're not, not if you buy from Swarovski.

A week or two ago, I caught my Swarovski's on the boot of the car, breaking the little plastic clip on the strap, not a disaster, but not good.

On Wednesday, I emailed Swaovski to ask for a new clip, I thought the strap was looking a bit shoddy (they are 10+ years old and have been most of the way around the world), but thought it cheeky to ask for a strap.

So today, while I was snowed in, the Postie arrived with a package from Swarovski, not just a clip but a whole new strap, in less than 48 hours since emailing them.....Amazing!

My Bins have been back to Austria twice, once my fault, once a design fault, both times they sent me another pair to use whilst mine were away.

I've not been to Druridge today, there was 6-8" of snow overnight and I thought it was unlikely the road to Druridge would have been treated. Should get down tomorrow, but as I write this the snow is beginning to fall again.

These pics were taken from our ringing site at Ellington