End of the Year

The thaw has continued over the past few days and Hogganfield, although still largely frozen, now has a slightly larger area of open water. Notwithstanding this it was a murky day and the light for digiscoping was not great.

Not much change bird wise except the thaw has persuaded 2 Goldeneye to return and the Pink Foot was again in with the Greylags.

Black Headed Gull - still in good numbers

The thaw had persuaded Goldeneye to return

Goldeneye Drake

1 Pink Foot in with the Greylags

Pinkfoot - a small quite dainty goose

Whooper Swan

Drake Goosander

Female Goosander

Under the Weather

Been feeling distinctly poorly since Christmas Eve with a particularly heavy cold. The weather itself has been cold and miserable and today was the first I felt like going out.

A thaw is now underway but the underfoot conditions, especially pavements, are treacherous. At Hogganfield there were a further 2 dead Swans (that make 4 in total during this cold spell) and the area of open water is very small. There were 14 Whooper Swans including 4 first year birds present today. Gull numbers were a bit up, but there was again no sign of the Med.


Adult LBB Gull - scarcer in Winter



Adult Common Gull

Drake Gadwall - showing close in to the car park

Drake Gadwall - close up

Drake Gadwall - rear view

In the Garden

I planted a Crab Apple in the garden about 3 years ago. Fruit yield has been unspectacular but hey its only a young tree. Nonetheless, I usually save the fruit and put it in the freezer for the birds in the winter.

The temperature today was minus 9 at 10:00 am and at its maximum it probably reached about minus 5. I defrosted some of the apples and put them out for the birds. One of the dominant male Blackbirds has been gorging itself all day. As well as this a Mistle Thrush has been making use of my cotoneaster berries.

Blackie at the apples

Blackbird - waiting his turn

Dunnock

Woodpigeon

Christmas Party Season

The onset of the Christmas Party season impacts on time spent birding.

That of course does not completely proclude birds and I'm not just talking about Turkey on the dinner plate. That being said, pickings were a bit thin this weekend with not one but two parties to negotiate. Birding was restricted to a post breakfast stroll close to the Rob Roy Hotel at Aberfoyle where we had  enjoyed a Christmas Party Night with Patricia's work. Several Blue Tits, Chaffinch, Wren & Treecreeper were all observed in nearby woodland.

At home Waxwings are still around and c25 were present in trees opposite the back of the house.








Winter Drawers On

I have got to say that the past week's winter weather is the worst I can remember. Back in the mid eighties I remember deeper snow (over the tops of wellies) but this week's snow combined with day time temperatures of minus 11 was a bit of a nightmare. Pipes froze in the house, central heating was off and significant travel disruption of course.

A thaw set in around Thursday evening but it has got colder again and this morning was back to below zero.

These conditions will have had consequences for birds and near home I have certainly noticed more Redwings and particularly Fieldfares around this week. One group of Redwings feeding in a holly bush in Brownside Road were completely unconcerned by my presence even though I was only a few feet away. Waxwings continue to be around with at least one heard over the house yesterday.

After a night out last night with Patricia and the girls for a Chinese including several drinks, I did not venture out to Hogganfield until about midday. The area of open water was even less than last Sunday and was still packed with Wildfowl. A sad sight was 2 dead Swans including a 1st year bird, presumably victims of the cold.

There was nothing particularly special around that I could see and Gull numbers continue to be very low. Perhaps more will appear in late December. I am off for a fortnight then and trailing round Gull roosts is something I look forward to at that time of year. How sad...........eh ?

Goosander - on ice !

Goosander - close up

Grey Lag Goose

Mallard Drake

Female Mallard

Moorhen

Drake Shoveler

Drake Tufted Duck

Drake Tufted Duck - showing white on wing

Viz Mig & Snow

Work was abandoned at 12:30 due to very heavy snow. Conditions were so bad that I was forced to walk home.

Viz mig on the way home included 2 Skylark, Fieldfare and Goldfinch. The obligatory Waxwings were in Burnside.

Skylark - in warmer times.

Images from a Frozen Hogganfield

Short visit mid morning. Temperature minus 4 degrees. Light rather against.

2 Sparrowhawks, 5 Shoveler, 1 Treecreeper. Again no sign of Med Gull.

Adult Winter Black Headed Gull

Coot

Coot

Drake Mallard

Mute & Whooper Swans

Whooper Swan





More Waxwings & Still Freezing

Snow & freezing temperatures have been present now for a full week. Travelling any distance is frankly a bit stupid so the plan today was to do some ironing and earn some brownie points and stay local.

After lunch I persuaded Patricia that she might enjoy a wee stroll round Hogganfield Loch. As I loaded up the car I heard that now familiar Waxwing trill. "That sound quite close" I thought and sure enough there was c20 in the big fir tree in one of the adjacent gardens at the back of our house. My immediate thoughts were to perhaps go & open Louise's window and take some shots. However, this would almost certainly be straight into the sun, so I didn't bother.

Hogganfiield was completely frozen apart from an area in front of the car park. The usual throng included 2 or 3 Shoveler and c5 Teal. I tried to take some shots of a very close drake Goosander, but they were so bad I deleted them when I got home.

We walked round the loch seeing very little with only 3 Kestels & 1 Fieldfare of any note. I had a quick scan for the Med Gull that I have seen reported this week but no sign.

On the way home there was another flock of Waxwings in berry bushes at Queenslie.

More freezing weather forecast for tonight !

100 Waxwing in Garden...................... well nearly !

Approximately 100 of the little beauties in trees adjacient to the railway line viewable from the dining room window late morning. Not a garden tick (I have had small numbers flying over the garden in previous Waxwing years) but this was certainly a record number.



Waxwing



Brrrrrrrr its Freezing !

About 2 inches of snow hit the Glasgow area last night and caused its usual chaos with cars sliding all over the place.

Undaunted, I headed to Hogganfield mid afternoon. There was only 3 small pockets of open water one of which was close to the car park and was thronged with ducks, geese & swans. By dusk there was close to 400 Grey Lag Geese present with at least 2 Pink Feet. At least 10 Whooper Swan were close to the car park making full use of the grain that the Council were putting out and of course the bread that passers by provide.

Some images from a freezing Hogganfield:

Wild Greylag Geese are very approachable at Hogganfield

Coot in fading light

Drake Goldeneye

Pink Foot & Greylag

Whooper Swans

Mega Grebe

A Pied Billed Grebe, the 1st in the UK for 10 years, had been found in Greater Manchester about 10 days ago but today (20 November) was my first opportunity to twitch it.

Leaving Glasgow at 4am on a cold foggy morning I did myself absolutely no favours whatsoever by not properly planning my route. On reflection once I got to Preston I should have carried on south on the M61 and then on to the M62 and that would have brought me in through Rochdale which is close to Littleborough where the bird was at.

However, my route along the M65 resulted in me getting lost in Burnley before eventually taking the scenic route to Littleborough. Even when I got to Littleborough I struggled to find Hollingworth Lake. The moral, I'm getting a proper sat nav for my Christmas !

The Pied Billed Grebe showed very well, down to a few yards at times, and the following record shots were obtained:

Pied Billed Grebe

Pied Billed Grebe

The bird's features including chunky size, thick bill with a black spot and no pale panels on the back of the neck were all fairly obvious.

The Pied Billed Grebe was almost the only bird on the lake with only a Canada Goose and a Great Crested Grebe worthy of mention.

By 10:15 I headed back west again and, surprisingly, found my way to Southport with little problem. I contemplated doing Martin Mere but took one look at the car park and decided that it was probably a bad idea. The overflow car park was literally overflowing. Marshside had comparatively few visitors and getting into hides etc was absolutely no problem. The only annoyance is Marine Drive that is very busy with cars although once you are below the reserve banking you hardly notice it.

Bird wise Marshside was an absolute delight with thousands of Ducks, Geese and Waders present on a beautiful winter sun lit afternoon. Large flocks of Pink Feet were in the far fields with some Greylag and Canada. Large flocks of Waders, including Black Tailed Godwit, Lapwing & Golden Plover and Starlings constantly wheeled around. Huge flocks of Wigeon, Shoveler and Teal showed how important the reserve is as a wintering site for these birds.

Particularly notable birds were a female Merlin and 1 Ruff. Some images from a terrific afternoon:

Black Tailed Godwit

Drake Gadwall

Moorhen

Drake Pintail

Shelduck

Drake Shoveler

Waxwings more Waxwings

My route into work over the past week has produced regular flocks of 30+ Waxwing in Burnside.

There was also 30+ in trees outside the office on the 8th of November.

Lochmaben & Caerlaverock 06 Nov 10

Iain was at my house for 8am and we were off down the M74. The first stop was Lochmaben.

Several large flocks of Pink Feet were overhead. The loch held reasonable numbers of common ducks including both Goldeneye and Tufted.

The woods are reputed to hold Willow Tit but despite searching we did not connect. A Nuthatch was heard calling and we had some Siskin and Treecreeper.

We headed for Caerlaverock and were there for about 11:30. A Green Winged Teal had been reported from the Campbell hide and we found it roosting with Teal:

We later saw it more clearly on open water and were able to confirm the vertical white stripe was present on both sides on the breast.

A winter plumaged Spotted Redshank was present from the same hide.

The Avenue Tower hide produced our first big flocks of Barnacle Geese and a female Merlin:

A single Ruff was also on the flood.

We did the Swan feed at 2pm but other than the spectacle it produced nothing of great interest.

We spent some time round at the Folly Pond late afternoon where a Black Tailed Godwit was of particular interest.

Drake Teal

Barnacle Geese