Saturday 4 February 2012

Common Snipe new for the year

The freezing weather has finally arrived and not before time; the basin is completely frozen and with the high tides below the requisite 6.5 metres until the middle of the week, no water is getting in and if the cold weather persists it is going to remain iced up. Apart from three Canada Geese and a couple of bemused Coots all of the wildfowl have decanted onto the creek and the Thames; Common Teal numbers are up with 397 counted today, the female Pintail is still in residence and eight Tufted Duck were on the Thames with a single male on the creek. A cold spell usually triggers an increase in Redshank numbers, but not this time, 16 were in the roost, pretty much what it's been all year so far. The tide wasn't high enough to cover all the mud and two Common Sandpipers were taking advantage of the increased opportunity to feed. Thankfully the water pump on the feeder stream in the ecology park was working, keeping the stream and lammas meadow unfrozen attracting a Common Snipe which I managed to flush on my second circuit early in the afternoon. Despite the freezing weather two pairs of Dunnock were displaying, just about the only passerine activity of note; now that the local Grey Squirrels have finally been driven to their dreys by the cold I decided to resume my feeding programme which produced almost instant dividends with five Chaffinch and four Greenfinch feeding in the seeded-up area and two Blue Tits on the fat balls; if these conditions continue I am fairly confident that the seed will attract something a little special with Brambling being at the top of my wants list.

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