Stuck on the farm...

After an unexpected heavy snow fall in the night, my plans to go out putting up bird boxes came to a holt when I couldn't get the car up the lane!! Luckily there's always something to see on the farm. This weekend is the rspb's Big Garden Bird Watch, where they ask people to spend an hour in there garden, making a note of all the birds that visit it. Since I've changed the feeders around, it's not been as easy to count the birds, because when they are feeding you have to look out of one window, and when they're not you have to look out of a different window on the other side of the house. Anyway, here's what I managed to count- 1 male Redpoll,

35+ Siskins, 10+ Goldfinches, 20+ Chaffinches, 10+ Greenfinches, 1 Bullfinch, 25+ Blue Tits, 10+ Great Tits, 5+ Coal Tits, 1 Marsh Tit, 10+ Blackbirds, 5+ Robins, 3+ Nuthatches, 4+ Dunnocks, 12+ House Sparrows, 1 Fieldfare, 2 Great Spotted Woodpeckers, 2 Crows, 2 Magpies, 3 Jays, 1 Sparrowhawk and 8+ Starlings.

Not a bad days birding really!

Black Kite revisited...

Decided to have a third got at the Black Kite at gigrin today (it's great to have a rarity on your doorstep!). It showed amazingly well again, with around 400 of it's red cousins.

Other birds present included 20+ Buzzards, 50+ Crows, 15+ Rooks, 10+ Ravens, 2 Grey Herons, 3 Pied Wagtails and 6 Long-tailed Tits.

A wild 'Grouse' chase...

Me and dad set off to R.W.T Becon Hill this morning , as I had been asked by the rwt it I could carry out some bird surveys over the winter to see what was up there as they had no records up there for the winter months. This was the 1st decent chance of getting up to the reserve in over 2 months either because of bad weather or other commitments! The roads were still a bit dodgy but we were determined to get there, we even had to walk a mile or so to get to the reserve from where we had to park because there was still lots of snow there. Ironically were saw more birds walk there (Yellowhammer, Stock Dove, Pheasant and other odds and sods) than on the reserve it's self. After spending several hours looking for Red Grouse we finally heard one calling, and before long we saw him. We then tried to look to see where he had flown to, then out of the heather he popped and another one, great. After watching and listening to them for a few more minutes a third bird got up out of the heather, fantastic - well worth the sweat and tears getting there!!

1st Jack Snipe of the year...

Myself and Tony set off to north Rads early this morning to see if we could find any Woodcock to ring as there seem to be fewer and fewer on the coast since the thaw set in. We only managed to catch 1 out of 12 very jumpy Woodcock, but we did manage to catch our 1st Jack Snipe of the year (7 ringed between us last year, so a long way to go yet!), which made up for the lack of Woodcock.

Early morning ringing...

With the moon not setting until very late in the night at the moment, the only chance of ring for the next few days is first thing in the morning before light, so at 03:00 me and tony set off to Ynyslas to see what we could catch. Disspite there being far fewer birds around we caught 4 Lapwings, 3 Woodcock and a Snipe.

Birding in Cardiff...

I decided to come home the long way from Essex and do some birding in Cardiff. After getting my UK year list over 100 birds I was keen to see what I could get my welsh list up to. 1st stop was Goldcliff pools, plenty of birds here including a redhead smew, 150+ Grey Plovers, 150+ Knot, 1 Greenshank and a Spotted Redshank (other year ticks included Turnstone and Gadwall). Next stop Cardiff Bay, were I saw the returning Lesser Scaup, 2 Greater Scaup and loads of Coots.

Final Stop before heading home was Cosmeston Lakes, where I was hoping to catch a glimpse of a Bittern. Sadly no joy on that front, but I did manage to add a few more birds on to my year list including Common Gull, and Pink-foot Goose (Wales year list is now 110)

Ringing @ Ynyslas...

With the thaw now set in myself, Dad, Tony, Donal and Jane set off to Ynyslas to see what birds were around and how they had coped in the recent cold snap! Despite almost a month of harsh weather, all of the birds caught were a very healthy weight! Birds trapped and ringed included 10 Woodcock, 4 Snipe, 7 Lapwings, 1 Golden Plover, 2 Redshanks and 1 Oystercatcher.