A couple of interesting
groups of birds have been seen on the ‘patch’ in the last few days. The most
interesting sighting was a group of 11 Common Starlings that were seen flying
around the percolation pond getting ready to roost in the reed beds. This is
only the second time I have seen the species on my local patch with the first
some years ago when three birds were seen on a football field near my house.
Common Starling is not an unusual visitor to the region in winter but rarely
gets onto the camp. This is what having a real local ‘patch’ is all about,
finding good birds on the area you bird regularly even if they are not rare,
even locally. The other interesting group of birds was 13 Eurasian Skylarks in
the edge of the spray fields. Again this species in not uncommon as a winter
visitor but do not occur so often on the camp. They occur every autumn in small
numbers and are almost always in the spray fields, but this was the first
sighting of the winter. Other interesting birds included a Eurasian
Sparrowhawk, 21 Little Stints, Curlew Sandpiper, Green Sandpiper and five
Common Snipe. Duck numbers still continue to rise with an amazing 105 Common
Pochards now present on the percolation pond with three Tufted Ducks, nine
Ferruginous Ducks and 65 Northern Shovelers.
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| Common Starling |
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| Eurasian Skylark |
