Glauc

More photos of last week's Glauc at Moore

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This morning I spent a bit of time parked up by the feeding station. In the hedge at the time were 60+ Tree Sparrows (with the now usual lone Starling which seems to hang around the flock) plus 15 Chaffinches, 9 Yellowhammers and 2 Reed Buntings. Suddenly a female Merlin flew in and made a grab at the birds and missed. She struck right in front of the car and showed spectacular aerobatics - unfortunately for her the only result was harrassment from a pair of Mistle Thrushes. It was very noticeable that the flock went completely silent in the hedge for a long time afterwards - normally when a Spar visits they are back up and chattering within 10 minutes.

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Single Buzzard and Kestrel were also present. At dusk I parked up again and watched a covey of 7 Grey Partridges wander over to the feeding area. The "alpha male" was constantly contact calling. Ten minutes later a covey of eight birds approached - these were totally silent while the male from the previous covey started alarm calling. Usually in these circumstances the larger covey drives the smaller one away - these two coveys continued to feed albeit with a careful space between them. In the field opposite two more coveys (9 and 8) were present bringing the total to 32 birds.

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In the garden a male Sparrowhawk flew through three times today - looked like the same bird but could have been more than one. Last Thursday while watching finches on the feeders a male Spar struck at the birds. It rained feathers, however they all seemed to escape. Less lucky was a Collared Dove which was found plucked on the lawn yesterday. Unusually today eight Magpies spent most of the day in the garden - usually I just see the resident pair. Oh and the cock Pheasant was back!

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At HGF today were:

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55 Wigeon

58 Coot

1 Pochard

3 Ruddy Ducks

13 Tufted Duck

2 Cormorants

1 Little Grebe

133 Black-headed Gulls

3 Comon Gulls

1 Grey Wagtail

1 Buzzard

6 Mute Swans

1 Redshank

11 Lapwings