By lunchtime the wind had picked up, and even though it was blowing from the south and the sun was out it still felt bitterly cold. The corner orchard was surprisingly quiet with only a smattering of Fieldfares and Redwings and a single Waxwing. Moving onto the Church Orchard (Genebank) I met a couple who had no luck with the Waxwings but a lot more Redwings, especially in the churchyard Yews. With things looking quiet in the orchards I made a quick sortie to Bradbourne Lake. A couple of drake Shoveler remained, along with 3x Tufted Ducks but even here things were quieter. 101x Canada Geese and a couple of Greylag Geese drifted around on the lake, 48x Black-headed, 5x Common and 3x Herring Gulls loafed on the Sports Ground. Back up to the orchards and I was pleased to meet the couple on their way back - they'd connected with at least 4x Waxwings sitting out on the Walnut Trees at the N end of the corner orchard. By the time I got there this has increased to eight and they dropped down to feed on apples giving more photo opportunities. I moved on to check some of the other orchards to see where the 52 birds seen this morning by Eddie Denson had gone. No luck, but 8x Common Gull were feeding on the grass area adjacent to the bypass road.
1w Common Gull on the Bypass grass
Returning to the orchard I disturbed a group of Waxwings, probably 12-15 birds which flew towards the Church orchard. John from Ditton had been watching them and informed me that he'd had a group strip a hybrid Rowan X Sorbus tree of it's berries outside his house in St Peter's Road a few days ago.
It was good to meet some of my blog followers and local birders today...all very well-behaved! And more photos.......
3 comments:
Lovely photos Adam!!!
Just can't get enough of the Waxwing pics Adam. Got to make the most of them!
Hi Adam, keep those great Waxwing photos coming. It was much quieter on Clare Park lake yeaterday too, all the Gadwall(20) and Tufted (8) have moved on now.
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