The End

Well that’s it, the end of the ringing year. The weather forecast is so bad that it’s highly unlikely we can manage a ringing session until 2023. 

At least here in the UK we are not suffering from the violent and extreme weather occurring across North America, conditions causing severe disruption and deaths at a time of year that is for celebration. 

It mostly happens that we in North West England receive the tail end of North American weather via Atlantic weather systems and already our own forecasters are predicting New Year snow and ice for us. 

This morning I made my usual trip out Pilling Way to drop supplementary Christmas Fayre for our feathered friends. This will pay dividends soon by way of preventing the premature deaths of birds unable to find their customary food in snow and ice. 

Just two days after the Winter Solstice a Cetti’s Warbler sang out from the edge of the reedy scrub, the exact same spot of November after which all appeared to go quiet. I rather hoped the Cetti’s had looked in his diary and thought this was the time to strike up the band. 

Perhaps not as the extra daylight is not too noticeable just yet but the sound of the Cetti’s and then another sighting of the now confirmed wintering Marsh Harrier gave me positive vibes for the weeks ahead. There's little doubt that both species could breed in this area with sympathetic ownership and management of certain tracts of land.

Cetti's Warbler

Marsh Harrier

I saw no birds on or around the plot prepped for whoosh netting but where many tiny footprints told a different story. Our time will come as the weather turns colder when perhaps even the Linnets may return. The normally dependable Linnets are not around at the moment and it could be that many have gone even further south during the freeze of early and mid-December. 

In the absence of other news here’s a few paragraphs about the very same feeding station from 13 January earlier this year, a clue as to what may be around two weeks into a new year when winter  subsides and spring is around the corner.  And how time flies! 

January 13th 2022. 

In most UK winters the Brambling is a difficult one to find but a bird to prize. These cousins of the ubiquitous Chaffinch live north and east of here on the borders of Finland & Russia, venturing this far west in irregular numbers and unpredictable years. 

At the feeding station I‘ve listened for the nasal wheeze, watched the feeders and the ground beneath for weeks while studying the hedgerow for a flash of white rump amongst the Chaffinches. And then on Wednesday, joy of joys, at last a Brambling, crouching amongst half a dozen Chaffinches, an orange-tinged one, reward for the seed drops and the interminable car washing after the tortuous muddy farm track.

Brambling

The finches scattered for no reason when I saw that the Brambling, now in a nearby tree, was male, perhaps even an adult but not for definite until and if we catch the star. (We did).   

A couple of Reed Buntings, 3 Greenfinch, three or more Blackbirds and 20 or so Linnets completed the count as I scattered more seed in the base of the hedgerow where even the Sparrowhawk’s long legs won’t reach.  

Greenfinch

Chaffinch

Blackbird

I saw Brown Hares on the move too, three together in the first of their Mad March ways. 

I left the Pilling farm and drove to Cockerham where at weekend Andy and I had prepared the seed plot for our now annual whoosh netting of Linnets and the sometime bonus of Skylarks and Stonechats. 

Happy Christmas and a Bird-Filled New Year everyone. Linking today to Eileen's Blogspot and Anni in Texas.