Oh Dear, How Sad. Never Mind.

I made it to Pilling on Friday morning and met up with Will for a spot of ringing. Another quiet session saw a catch of just 9 birds - 6 Linnet, 1 Sedge Warbler, 1 Chiffchaff and 1 Robin. 

The ringing was quiet but birding while sat in the warming sunshine proved immensely entertaining.  We saw two but possibly three separate Marsh Harriers, one in clear north to south migration, the other two patrolling the landscape. 

A Peregrine tried twice to catch Stock Doves and while the Peregrine failed to connect a Buzzard hung around just in case there were spoils to be had. 

A Sparrowhawk, 3 Little Egrets and 2 Grey Herons added to our sightings with small flights of both Wigeon and Teal in the mix. Linnet numbers are down with a low count of 50/60 made up of small parties between 3 and 8. 

The numbers are down in all respects from those of two and three weeks ago. We suspect that we have witnessed a juvenile dispersal of some magnitude and that there will now be a lull until the arrival of more Linnets when colder weather arrives.   

 

Chiffchaff

 

Sedge Warbler

Robin

Marsh Harrier

There are more birds, birding and photos to come.  Log in soon to Another Bird Blog.

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Meanwhile, there’s interesting and up to date news from Another Bird Blog’s Game and Sporting Correspondent. 

As a reminder and estimates vary, approximately 32 million Pheasants, 9 million Red-legged Partridges and 2.6 million Mallards are released into the countryside annually in the UK. The birds are released to provide ‘sport’ for people who live in or travel to the countryside. The released birds are subsequently killed during highly organised shooting occasions throughout the late autumn and winter months. 

This is known as Driven Game Shooting, a form of shooting more formal than simply walking with a dog alongside the hedgerows, and is usually confined to pheasant, partridge and grouse shooting.

On the shoot day, a team of shooters, or Guns, line out at numbered pegs. Meanwhile, under the gamekeeper’s instructions, a group of beaters and their dogs move through areas of woodland or covert, flushing the game ahead of them.

The aim is to get the birds to break cover and fly high over the line of Guns to provide sporting shots. Shot game is retrieved quickly by a picker-up who sends his/her trained gundog to where the shot game falls. Because of the organisation and number of people involved in a shoot of this sort, the financial cost to the Guns is considerably higher than in the other types of shooting.

Pheasant rearing

“Pippa, her posh pals, piles of dead pheasants and partridges... and some very pukka wellies” 

Daily Mail UK

The huge demand for the millions of young gamebirds (poults) reared for shooting in the countryside needs both home grown birds and imports from Europe. The largest exporters of gamebirds to the UK are France, Poland and Spain. France is by far the largest supplier of factory-farmed pheasants to the UK shooting industry with the Eurotunnel the main supply route for these birds. 

It seems that the price of Pheasant poults in particular is suffering from the same if not higher levels of inflation than the price of Waitrose avocados. Rearing birds requires labour, food, water, transport, husbandry, heating and energy, all of it getting more expensive by the day. 

In the early part of 2022 the industry worried that the price for a single poult might reach the dizzy heights of £5. 

During 2021/2022, France saw a high level of H5N1 Avian Flu outbreaks concentrated in the Vendee and Loire Atlantique regions - some of the main suppliers of game birds and eggs to the British game keeping market – as well as in French game birds themselves. 

The wave of cases in the southwest of France led to the culling of about 4 million birds, according to Reuters. There were 975 outbreaks of avian flu in the country between late November and March 2022. During this time France also experienced restrictions of movement and lockdowns of people and services due to Covid. 

This perfect storm of circumstances has seen the price of Pheasant poults imported to the UK rocket to near £10 a bird, a price that threatens the financial viability of UK shoots where attendance at even the smallest gathering may require a payment of £1,000 or more per person per day. 

It appears that some French producers who earlier in 2022 took orders from the UK have now reneged on deals or stated that they are unable meet new orders. The result is that as the shooting season of 1st September draws near, the price of a single UK grown poult for immediate supply was very recently quoted at £12.50 by a Lancashire supplier keen to fill the gaps in supply. 

A Gun

Organiser of shoots and their Guns worry they may have to cut down on the number of shooting days this winter.

Whatever happens from here on it seems likely that at the very least there will be less shooting this winter, with a corresponding lessening impact on the environment & countryside caused by the release of many thousands of factory farmed birds. 

Linking this weekend to Eileen's Blogspot and Anni in Texas.

 

Double Whammy

There’s a double blow to our ringing plans this weekend. Number One is the weather with a Red weather warning of severe winds up to 70mph over northern Britain as Storm Arwen passes over in a north to south direction. Sat here in my office there’s a hoolie blowing and I’m not for going anywhere until Monday when the winds should ease. 

Wednesday saw another visit to Project Linnet where Catch of the Day was that extreme rarity - a Song Thrush. After a little levelling off in recent years the graph seems to be heading in a downward direction again via “a rapid decline in England” - BTO Bird Trends. 

For what it’s worth the decline in this part of Lancashire seems especially marked where the Song Thrush is no longer a garden bird and is one that receives barely a mention on local bird news Internet sites. Our own catches of Song Thrushes number so few that catching a Song Thrush becomes a Red Letter Day. 

Bird Trends - British Trust for Ornithology

 

Song Thrush 

In addition to the single Song Thrush we caught 1 Redwing, 2 “continental” Blackbirds, 2 Blue Tit, 1 Greenfinch, 1 Robin and added another seven Linnets to our totals. 

Redwing

Greenfinch

Linnet

Just as were looked forward to better weather next week, Friday morning brought unwelcome Blow Number Two. 

“Dear Philip” 

“Avian influenza H5N1 (pathogenicity to be confirmed) has been found in a premises near Poulton le Fylde, Wyre, Lancashire. A 3km and 10km Control Zone has been put in place around the premises. Please see the map here for more information (search on SD3748). 

You are being notified as we can see you, or your ringing group, have either submitted ringing records from close to the outbreak in recent years or your postal address is within the area. 

Effective immediately, as a precaution, the following measures apply: All ringing is suspended within the 10 km Control Zone as outlined on the map until further notice. 

We will inform you by email when ringing can recommence and we will be monitoring the situation during the BTO Christmas period.” 

Avian Flu Hotspot

 

A couple of our local ringing sites fall into the exclusion zone, another unwanted blow to our commitment to local bird ringing, activities that monitor bird populations for the benefit of society as a whole. Project Linnet (and farmland birds) is now on hold until sometime in 2022. 

This latest episode is the third recorded outbreak of bird flu at the same Preesall/Pilling premises https://anotherbirdblog.blogspot.com/2017/01/a-touch-of-flu.html 

Once again in 2021 the avian virus has been found where Pheasants, Red-legged Partridge and Mallards are reared in captivity so as to be released into the countryside for shooting. This is a subject covered many times here on Another Bird Blog, in the birding press on a regular basis and in National newspapers on a number of occasions. As ever there is no interest from the UK Government or other parties to put a stop to an archaic practice that has such a devastating impact upon native species. 

The BTO Atlas of 2013 tells me that the numbers of captive-bred Pheasants released into the wild has increased fivefold since the early 1960s to around 35 million birds annually. Some 15 million Pheasant are shot annually. 

Captive Pheasant rearing

“High densities of Pheasants potentially have negative effects on native species, but these have been poorly studied. Indirect effects possibly include modification of the structure of the field layer, the spread of disease and parasites and competition for food. Recent research indicates that infection with caecal nematodes from farm-reared Pheasants may be contributing to the decline of Grey Partridge.” 

Grey Partridge

When I watch hordes of young Pheasants thundering through late summer fields and woodland edge there is no doubt in my mind that their effect on the environment is wholly negative. 

The BTO Atlas also states that there has been a 91% population decline of Grey Partridge in the UK between 1967-2010, during the Breeding Atlas of 1968-72 and the Breeding Atlas of 1988-91. 

“Local extinctions may be masked in some areas by the release of captive-bred birds onto shooting estates: about 100,000 captive-reared Grey Partridges are released in Britain each year”. The Atlas gives no figures on the number of captive-bred birds subsequently shot for sport; neither does it give any indication of how any surviving birds impact upon any truly wild Grey Partridge population. 

Given that the Grey Partridge is in any case a secretive and difficult species to study, any such investigation would by now be almost impossible to conduct. 

The problem is further complicated by the release into the same environment of Red-legged Partridge, a picture I know only too well from local farms. 

Red=legged Partridge

 

"As more farms diversify into shooting, the number of Red-legged Partridges released has increased and this is illustrated by the National Gamebag Census, where numbers shot quadrupled between 1990 and 2005 (Game & Wildlife Conservation Trust 2013). It is estimated that 6.5 million partridges (Grey and Red-legged) were released across the UK in 2004, and 2.6 million were shot. There has been little research on the impacts of released birds on native species, but there is some evidence that shooting operations based on large-scale releases of Red-legged Partridges could be implicated in local extinctions of Grey Partridges.” 

Red-legged Partridge

To my unscientific but daily birding eyes that last sentence would seem to be a gross understatement. 

At the end of the day there is one conclusion to be drawn from this now familiar, sorry story. 

Nothing will change - just Follow The Money. 

Linking this post to https://viewingnaturewitheileen.blogspot.com.

 

The Times They Are A Changin’

Here I am showing my age in quoting Bob Dylan from 1963. I’m off the road for a few days but Thursday and Friday look hopeful for my first ringing since arriving back from Greece. 

Meanwhile, here’s a topic tackled previously on Another Bird Blog right back to 2013. Some might accuse me of “banging on about it” - the subject of so called “game shooting”. Below are just five links to previous posts dedicated to the subject in attempts to draw attention to what is a national scandal – the killing for fun of many millions of birds. 

https://anotherbirdblog.blogspot.com/2020/01/an-unfunny-game.html

https://anotherbirdblog.blogspot.com/2014/06/buzzards-here-we-go-again.html

https://anotherbirdblog.blogspot.com/2013/11/these-sporting-times.html 

https://anotherbirdblog.blogspot.com/2014/06/buzzard-update-birding-update.html

https://anotherbirdblog.blogspot.com/2017/03/theres-still-no-ringing-allowed-near.html 

But now this weekend comes what is described as an “existential challenge” to the industry as none other than the RSPB takes sides in the ongoing debate. This from an article in The Sunday Times of 10 October 2020. 

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“Pheasant shooting is facing an existential challenge as the RSPB prepares to end its neutrality on the sport by demanding reforms to protect native wildlife. More than 50 million non-native game birds are released each year by shoots, and conservationists say this has a devastating impact on other species. 

Only about a third of 47 million Pheasants and 10 million Red-legged Partridges released are shot and retrieved as the remainder become food for scavengers such as foxes, crows and rats, boosting their numbers. They in turn prey on threatened species such as Curlews and Lapwings. 

Reptile experts have also blamed the rise in pheasants for the decline in adders as the birds kill adult snakes and swallow young ones whole. Another concern is that some shoots secretly dump dead pheasants because the number killed far exceeds the demand for game meat. The Times revealed footage of dozens of dozens of dead Pheasants being dumped into a pit by a digger on a farm in Leicestershire last year, 2019. 

Pheasant

There are more than 5000 shoots and customers often pay thousands of pounds to kill hundreds of birds each day. The RSPB Royal Charter, granted by Edward VII in 1904 describes game bird shooting as “legitimate sport” and the charity has previously resisted calls from members for it to campaign against the mass release of birds. 

The charter says “The society shall take no part in the question of the killing of game birds and the legitimate sport of that character except when such practices have an impact on the objects”. The objects include “conserving wild birds and other wildlife”. Mounting evidence of the harmful impact of the mass release of game birds, which has risen tenfold since the 1970s , prompted the RSPB last year to order a review of its policy. The results of that review are due to be presented at the charity’s annual meeting today. 

This summer the charity quietly adopted a set of “conservation principles” on game shooting which pro-shooting groups feared would place severe restrictions on the sport. Under the principles, game bird shooting “must not adversely affect the population of any native species”. Shoot practices should be “assessed for their environmental impacts and regulated, enforced and in some cases stopped”. Eight out of ten RSPB members strongly supported those principles in a survey conducted by the charity in February and March. 

Shooting groups fear that the RSPB which has 1.2 million members will use its influence to persuade the government to require shoots to obtain licences which could be withdrawn if problems were found. The charity has been calling since 2014 for driven grouse shooting to require a licence because of evidence that gamekeepers kill protected birds of prey. 

Tim Bonner chief executive of pro-shooting Countryside Alliance said he disagreed with some of the principles, which “had no basis in international treaties or other conservation thinking that we can find”. He added “The RSPB has increasingly been influenced by a small clique of people who are obsessive about their dislike of shooting”. 

Chris Packham, the wildlife broadcaster is a vice –president of the RSPB and also co-founder of the group Wild Justice, which is bringing a legal challenge against the government, accusing it of being in breach of the EU habitats directive by allowing the mass release of game birds without assessing the impact on wildlife sites. 

A survey of shoot owners, managers and clients commissioned by the RSPB found that many saw the charity’s principles as “the start of a slippery slope towards restricting or banning shooting”. A report on the survey results said there was a lack of trust in the RSPB’s “underlying motivations” with some feeling “let down by the RSPB… for example a lack of acknowledgement of the benefits it can bring”. 

The British Association for Shooting and Conservation and Natural England co-funded a review of the environmental impact of game bird releases and found that releasing large numbers could have negative impacts on habitats and wildlife. However, it concluded - “The evidence suggests that at least some of these effects can be ameliorated by following best practice relating to sizes and densities.” 

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/game-shooters-fear-for-their-sport-as-rspb-chiefs-take-aim-vc9jpqkxg

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The decision of the RSPB to now take sides in this long going debate could well be a game changer. 

Red-legged Partridge

Watch this space for more news of the ongoing saga plus birding, ringing and photographs on Another Bird Blog.

 

Finding The Rares

May 3rd with once again a zero count of House Martins over the weekend, not even a fly by as often happens when early arrivals stop off and examine last year’s breeding sites under the neighbours’ eaves. The lack of martins is very noticeable because Sue and I have spent so much time in the garden recently without seeing and hearing the twittering arrival of House Martins. 

There was nothing for it but to check this out elsewhere on Monday to see if martins had arrived at other regular spots, even though there isn’t much information around during these stay at home times. After all, House Martins are not seen in too many gardens. 

I set out for my Monday stroll from one of my long-time workout spots at Cockerham. But first a spot of stood-still birding with lots to see on Conder Pool where most birds are now paired up but still a number of migrants. 

There are a decent number of pictures today so please “click the pics” for a closer look. 

The Avocets were both active and noisy with 5 pairs for sure and maybe an extra one or two individuals. Some are clearly sat on eggs while one pair spent time on the marsh clattering loudly as the tide rose to their feet. They were precisely where a pair bred last year, as if these two were weighing up the tidal rise and fall. 

 Avocet

 Avocet

Four pairs of Oystercatcher appeared to be on eggs with probably one pair of Redshank and 3 pair of Shelduck. Otherwise wildfowl – a pair of Canada Goose, a single drake Gadwall and 8 Tufted Duck. 

 Shelduck- female, male

There was no sign of recent Spotted Redshank or Little Ringed Plover today but 76 or more Black-tailed Godwit came in many shades from grey/brown to the dark brick red of the Icelandic race. A little distant but you get the picture. 

Black-tailed Godwit 

Bang on cue Common Terns are back on site, four today, where as usual they compete with the Black-headed Gulls for the likeliest spots. 

Common Tern 

Two Yellow Wagtails stayed but briefly where at one point they shared the outflow wall with a White Wagtail and a Pied Wagtail. Apologies for the poor picture; it’s an attractive but small bird some 35 yards away. A single Grey Heron and five Little Egrets seen - one or two of the latter in full summer adult plumage. 

Yellow Wagtail 

Little Egret 

I wasn’t seeing any House Martins and just 15/20 Swallows fed briefly before they too flew off into the distance. Zero Swifts too, but as one might expect, lots of Sand Martins (100+) at the quarry half-a-mile away. 

Other small birds arrived as 1 Wheatear, 1 Blackcap and 2 Whitethroat only, the early Wheatears now mainly moved on inland. Seemingly Whitethroats have yet to arrive in any numbers. 

Along Jeremy Lane I found a few Swallows hanging around the usual farms, waiting to be let in the buildings, and where yet again the Swallow numbers are severely depleted. 

Swallow 

Swallow 

It was soon after taking a picture of an obliging Pheasant that I found what may prove to be the rarity of the month - a pair of Grey Partridge. 

Pheasant 

 Grey Partridge

A little distant I know but a good find. 

If only the WhatsApp Rare Bird Forum was up and running I could post it on there, together with a zero count of House Martins. 

An Unfunny Game

The release of non-native game birds and their impact upon the environment is in the news again this week. It is an issue mentioned several time on Another Bird Blog with the intention of alerting Joe Public to elements of the countryside that David Attenborough does not show. 

An estimated 40/50 million Common Pheasants and up to 10 million Red-legged Partridges are released into the countryside prior to the shooting season opening each 1 October.  

Red-legged Partridge 

Pheasant

The current pheasant and partridge shooting seasons draw to a close at the end of January 2020. The 2020 season opens on 1 October for Common Pheasant and 1 September for Red-legged Partridge. Releases of captive-bred birds occur prior to this, usually in July when trailer loads of pen-reared game-birds are transported to the shooting fields and released. Being pen-reared and regularly fed from leaving the egg the youngsters find most of their food from bins spaced at regular intervals throughout each shoot. 

Pen Rearing

 Off To The Shoot - Raptor Persecution Scotland

Feed Bin

The waste from transportation and feed bins provides rich pickings for predators of the crow family, mainly Carrion Crows. This easy availability of food throughout the winter months may have been a factor in the crows’ increased population since the 1960s, a trend associated with increases in nesting success/earlier laying. 

Carrion Crows take nestlings of small farmland birds and the eggs & chicks of waders, a fact of life easily witnessed by field workers. Some studies have found that crows along with their cousins the Magpie and the Raven have surprisingly little impact on the abundance of other bird species. I’m pretty certain those studies have not taken place in the Fylde Lancashire where it is not uncommon to see many hundreds of Carrion Crows on fields that are regularly shot and where lines of feed bins cross the landscape. 

A white Red-legged Partridge 

Carrion Crow 

Around 60% of game-birds released for shooting in the UK, an estimated 25/30 million birds, do not end up at their intended fate of being shot. This constitutes wastage, raising economic, environmental and ethical questions. There are four main reasons: predation, disease, starvation and dispersal into the wider countryside. Roadkill and agricultural operations contribute yet more often unquantifiable deaths. Early morning drives through areas of shoots will see many fresh corpses on carriageways where inexperienced and newly released game-birds meet the combustion engine. 

Pheasant Roadkill

The National Gamebag Census (NGC) records information provided by around 600 participating estates throughout Britain on shooting bags. There is no actual quantification of releasing as the NGC is a fraction of the actual shoots, many of which are on a small scale basis of individual and/or neighbouring farms. This I know because there are a number in this part of Lancashire and where gamekeepers are reluctant or evasive in revealing the number of game birds they “put down” (release). 

From "Birdwatch" magazine 21 January 2020. 

The non-profit legal entity Wild Justice revealed this week that it has sent a second letter to The Department for Environment Food & Rural Affairs (DEFRA) about the effect of releasing millions of non-native game-birds into the British countryside. 

Last July Wild Justice challenged DEFRA's failure to assess the ecological impact on sites of conservation interest of releasing approximately 50 million game-birds into the countryside. The government department took two months to respond, but agreed that the Secretary of State would undertake a review of the release of such birds on or near protected sites. 

Since July 2019 DEFRA has failed to act. With zero progress, Wild Justice pursued the challenge and wrote again urging DEFRA to act quickly. 

In the letter, Wild Justice's lawyers Leigh Day stated that, with DEFRA having recognised the problem in September 2019, "it would be unlawful for those releases to take place in 2020 unless the possibility of them having detrimental impacts on the sites in question had been properly considered and specifically ruled out ahead of time".  As such, "the Secretary of State needs to initiate those processes now". The lawyers added: "To hold off doing that would lead to illegality later and so be unlawful now." 

Mark Avery, a co-director of Wild Justice columnist, commented: "We started this legal challenge last July, DEFRA took two months to respond (mid-September) and now we are past mid-January, only six months from the time when game-bird releasing might start again. DEFRA needs to get moving. This legal letter is designed to give them a very firm shove." 

It’s good news that Wild Justice should tackle this subject but I question their limiting the campaign to “sites of conservation interest”. The release of non-native game-birds is a problem that impacts the whole of the countryside, all of which is of conservation interest given the catastrophic decline of so many birds of farm and field during the last 40 years.

Linking this post to Eileen's Blogspot and Anni's Birding.

Overground And Underground

I set off this morning just in time to see a spectacular sunrise appear over Cockerham. Our west coast of Lancashire has remarkable sunsets also but there’s something very special about the light of a new day dawning over misty fields. 

A Cockerham Dawn

As usual I was on my way to Conder Green where with luck and more than a little perseverance it is possible to see a good selection of birds. I wouldn’t be disappointed, especially as the regular Barn Owl was doing the rounds of the road and the marsh at a steady 20 or so mph in trying to evade my camera and the odd vehicle that came by, even at 0600. 

Barn Owl

The usual birds graced the pool and the nearby creeks with waders at 90+ Lapwings, 30+ Redshank, 14 Oystercatcher, 5 Common Sandpiper, 2 Avocet, 2 Greenshank and 1 Dunlin. In the egret and heron department were the customary 3 Little Egret and a single Grey Heron, the numbers of both yet to show any real increase this autumn. 

Common Sandpiper

Tufted Duck have been present all spring and summer in fours, fives and sixes with the appearance today of a single brood of tiny young. With just three in tow the female has considerably less than the 10 or so ducklings more typical of the species immediately after nesting. The female flew in alone from over the canal calling to the youngsters as she landed that the coast was clear. The chicks quickly left  their hiding place in bankside vegetation and joined mum on the water. 

Tufted Duck

Other wildfowl seen - 6 Little Grebe, 2 Wigeon, 1 Teal and 1 Goosander. Four Swift flew around briefly and I suspect they were migrants as overall Swift numbers are down in the past week or two. How soon does summer change to autumn.

A quick look at Glasson Dock revealed several Coot, 6 Tufted Duck, a single Great Crested Grebe, and 2 Common Terns fishing both the dock and the yacht basin. 

I drove back over Stalmine Moss where I followed the song of a Yellowhammer, an increasingly scarce farmland bird which has reached almost celebrity status with local birders. A yellow male was singing from a fence post with a browner bird flying off as I approached the spot. 

Stalmine Moss

Yellowhammer

I stopped to watch a pair of Buzzard circling overhead but then noticed what looked like a small animal immobile in the centre of the carriageway. It was a very fresh but also very dead Mole. 

Mole - Talpa europaea

The Mole Talpa europaea is one of the most common and widespread of mammals in the UK, but because it spends most of its life in the tunnels which it digs, it is rarely seen. For most people, it is the familiar sight of molehills of soil in woods and fields and even on lawns which is their only experience of these secretive animals. 

Moles are only about 15cm long, but have stout forearms and broad front paws with strong claws which give the animal its ability to tunnel so effectively underground. Their bodies are roughly cylindrical with no neck and a pointed nose, and they are covered in thick, dark fur. 

A Mole’s diet mainly consists of earthworms, but they also feed on beetles and other insects, even baby mice and occasionally shrews if they come upon them while on the surface. A mole needs to eat the equivalent of its own bodyweight each day. In autumn they make a store of hundreds of earthworms to last them through the winter. The worms are usually chewed off at the front end so they cannot crawl away, but remain alive and so provide fresh food for several months. 

Moles are not blind, as most people believe. They do have eyes and internal ears, but these are very small to prevent them being clogged up and damaged during tunnelling. Although they can see, the mole’s eyesight is poor, with no ability to detect colours, just light from dark and movement. However, the mole has a special weapon to help it find other animals underground - an area of bare pink skin on the snout covered in tiny pimples that detect movement and the scents of prey and other moles. 

Large molehills mark the position of a nest, sometimes known as a “castle”. A line of small molehills marks the direction of a deep tunnel while a continuous line of earth marks a very shallow tunnel. Moles are considered as pests where they damage lawns and fields that farmers like to see flat. Many methods are used to try to eradicate them, often with only limited success. 

Mole harvest at Pilling

Stay tuned to Another Bird Blog. This weekend I am studying “Britain’s Birds”, an entirely new and must-have photographic field guide due for publication in mid-August. Read my review on here very soon. 

Britain's Birds

That's all for now. In the meantime I am linking this post to Run A Round Ranch and Anni's Birding Blog.

The Sunday Job

There was rain and then the wind blew my garden feeding station to the ground so the prospects for a morning’s birding weren’t good. Nonetheless there was a job to do at Oakenclough where the ringing station needed checking for a top up of bird seed, so I set off inland. 

It has not been much of a Fieldfare autumn so at Out Rawcliffe I was pleased to find a flock of 80 or more Fieldfares feeding in a stretch of roadside hawthorns. It’s a traditional and so almost guaranteed location to find the species, even when they can’t be seen elsewhere. I do wonder whether it is simply that the species homes in on the wealth of red berries hereabouts or if there is an element of a few individuals returning year after year to a known food source and bringing new birds along? 

As one of the larger and more robust members of the thrush family of birds, but bearing in mind it is highly migratory with all those attendant risks, an individual Fieldfare can be fairly long lived. Through the ringing of Fieldfares the longevity record of 18 years is held by a Finnish bird, in stark contrast to an average life expectancy of 2 or 3 years.

"Click the pics" for a light-box show.

Fieldfare

Fieldfare

There was a roadside Jay which scuttled off as my car approached and then the flap-glide-flap of a Sparrowhawk across the nearby field. I rather hoped the hawk wasn’t targeting the Fieldfares but they often do. 

As I neared Oakenclough I found a wary flock of 60/80 roadside Chaffinches, the birds scattering into nearby trees as I slowed to look. I switched off the engine then looked and listened for a while hoping to see or hear a Brambling or two but none showed. So far this is not a "Brambling Winter".

Chaffinch

Watercolour - Oakenclough, Lancashire

The feeding station had been well used with the niger and other seed depleted together with signs of trampling underfoot. Looks like we are fattening up the sportsmen’s pheasants in addition to feeding our own little brown jobs. Best to avoid a ringing session on a Tuesday when the hills echo to the sound of gunfire.

Pheasant

At or around the feeding station - 2 Bullfinch, 4 Blackbird, 15+ Chaffinch, 15+ Goldfinch, 2 Pied Wagtail and 1 Great-spotted Woodpecker, plus the usual selection of Robins, Dunnocks and titmice, mainly Coal Tit. 

Robin

Goldfinch

The weather forecast for the week ahead looks truly awful with strong westerly winds and lots of rain predicted to Friday which means that Andy and I may struggle to find a suitable day for ringing.

Oakenclough in Black & White 

Not to worry. If there’s a half a chance Another Bird Blog will be out there birding and blogging as ever.

Linking today to Stewart'sWorld Bird Wednesday.