The weather is much like the TV channels at the moment with no originality, lots of repeats and nothing much to enthuse over. Day after day of wind and rain here in northwest England has seen me sitting in front of the PC most days while wondering where the next blog post will come from.
More of the same beckoned until late on Tuesday night, but then on Wednesday morning the rain finally stopped, the wind dropped and the sun almost shone.
Pilling to Cockerham road
I met up with Andy and Dave at Pilling for another crack at the Linnets. Despite the recent rains I’d kept an eye on the Linnet flock with a couple of visits showing that contrary to my fears of a week ago, the Linnets had not entirely deserted this particular food source. Visits between 12th and 21st November gave counts varying from as low as 40 birds or as high as 230, so there was everything to play for this morning.
Linnets
Linnets
We donned wellies to enter the field of set-aside and splashed along the previously dry path to where the crop had now lost most of its autumn height. Linnets were around in some numbers and confirmed recent counts of 200+ but we managed to catch just eight as they proved very adept at feeding around our nets without going in.
Adult Linnet tail
Linnet
Linnet
Being a bird ringer quickly teaches you that birds are cleverer than we humans think. I’d swear those Linnets were trying their very best to avoid us this morning.
Linnets
We’ll leave it a week or more before we go back and try again. Log in soon to see more from Another Bird Blog.
Linking today to Theresa's Last Day and Stewart's World Bird Wednesday.
Linking today to Theresa's Last Day and Stewart's World Bird Wednesday.
Beautiful photos of the Linnet, Phil! What a lovely bird!
ReplyDeleteWhat a pretty bird. I've repeated my post about the Rufous-naped Lark from last week as I had several improved images of this - one of my favorite - birds.
ReplyDeleteLoved that Linnet picture. Is it somehow related to sparrows? Look very similar.
ReplyDeleteThe weather has indeed been wet, wet, wet!
ReplyDeleteYou were so fortunate to have a break in the weather to get out ...
Lovely photo's again, I always enjoy enlarging them.
Enjoy the rest of the week.
All the best Jan
Birds.............always trying to avoid me too!
ReplyDeleteI wouldn't mind seeing Lyn this repeatedly here as I don't see enough of them to you are fortunate to be able to see them so closely
ReplyDeleteHello Phil, awesome shots of the pretty Linnets. I wish you could send some of that rain here. Happy Thursday, enjoy your day and the weekend ahead!
ReplyDeletelove the flock at the fence! thank you, phil! thank you. blessings to you and continued birding and great photography days to you.
ReplyDeleteHappy Thanksgiving
ReplyDeleteWeather can be pretty frustrating for sure, Phil. Hang in there and the good stuff will return. We came back from Cuba last night (early this morning actually) to the first snow of the season - not much, but enough to make driving a little tricky.
ReplyDeleteYour weather is so much like the Pacific Northwest part of this country! It's always a joy this time of year to have a good weather day ... and I suppose that we appreciate those more than people do where they are more common. (But as you know we nowadays we migrate and miss most of the bad ones.). The linnets are sweet and it was fun to see the feathery closeup. I am glad to hear that even experts like you sometimes get outwitted by birds. I know they are smart ... and they can be cruel ... so often as soon as I touch my camera they fly away. .
ReplyDeleteHello Phil!:) We are now getting bad weather, and it's colder than most Novembers I remember. Beautiful fence shots with all the Linnets. It's a pretty bird, and I enjoyed seeing the tail closeup.
ReplyDeleteGlad you got some, Phil. They are doing their duty!
ReplyDelete~
Enjoyed seeing a close up of the tail. A lovely little bird.
ReplyDeleteLovely shots.
ReplyDeleteGreat photos of the Linnets in-flight and the tail is very beautiful. Imagine donning "wellies" to go out birding - IMO that is real dedication!!
ReplyDeleteLovely photos ~ my favorite is the head shot of the linette ~
ReplyDeleteWishing you a Happy and Fun Week ~ ^_^