Wild Bird Feeding Stations

Great White Egret at
Pitsford Reservoir courtesy
of Cathy Ryden.

Hello

I spent most of today visiting wild bird feeding stations and ensuring there was plenty of food on offer in these cold temperatures. A Siskin was present at Kelmarsh Hall but otherwise it was quiet; Scotland Wood was the venue for some very vocal Nuthatches and the Marsh Tits came straight in for broadcast sunflower seeds.

Birds visible from the Old Scaldwell Road feeding station at Pitsford Reservoir at lunchtime amounted to just a single Great White Egret, three first winter Scaup and a couple of Pintail.

At least one Grey Wagtail was present at Brixworth Water Treatment Works and a pair of Stonechat remain in the Brampton Valley below Hanging Houghton.

An afternoon walk at Harrington Airfield was a great way to appreciate the amazing colours created by the setting sun but the birds were mostly absent with just five Golden Plovers whizzing about.

CNX338 is a ring number read on a Goldcrest at Pitsford Reservoir on 13th November and it transpires that this bird was first caught and ringed at Theddlethorpe St Helen, Mablethorpe on the Lincolnshire coast on 11th October 2016. This bird exhibited top of the scale biometrics when processed at Pitsford and the circumstances suggest that this was a continental bird still very much on a SSW bearing. It took this little mite 33 days to travel 139km from Mablethorpe to Pitsford.

Confirmation has now been received that the Grey Wagtail caught at Pitsford Res on 13th November already bearing a ring was originally ringed as a nestling at Stanford Reservoir on 14th July 2016. This bird clearly hasn't travelled too far since fledging on the Northants/Leicestershire border.

Regards

Neil M

Goldcrest

Siskin.
Relatively few around so
far this season but they are
likely to increase in the back
half of the winter...