With Tier 4 now in full swing and movement restricted to local only, the start of Norton 2020 has been delayed so for the time being I’ll have to make the most of walking the local area close to home.
This morning I set out with the plan to check some of the wet woodland in the local area for marsh tits. Thankfully the local area is still pretty good for them on the habitat still looks really good for willow tit although sadly they are probably long gone.
Despite the recent cold weather it actually seemed quite quiet for birds in the woodland although with several male great tits singing strongly, maybe the birds I’ve already started to disperse under their breeding territories. However the first small tit flock came across contained two marsh tits which was a pretty good start.
The pools in the bottom of the valley held a few duck, which is quite unusual, including 14 gadwall, a calling little grebe and several teal although I could only hear them as they were in a thickly vegetated area. The best bird was a woodcock flushed from the side of the road while searching for tit flocks.
The wet area at the far end of the walk is an excellent area of wetland habitat especially after all the rain we've had recently. Sadly though none of it is accessible and can only be viewed from the footpaths and roads that run around the outside. I’m sure if you could walk it it would be full of snipe, jack snipe and water rail and I bet there is a good chance of wintering bittern. Watching from the river bridge I had two female Marsh Harrier hunting the area and fingfisher perched up. At the north end of this wet river valley there is a small area of open water which is the best place for attracting waterfowl. Today there were 24 wigeon and three tail on the pool.
The best however was in the field next to the pool where a cattle egret was feeding with the cows. I had already seen a couple of groups of cows which I checked for egrets considering how the population has increased in the local area in the last couple of years so I wasn’t surprised when I eventually found one. Despite being a regular sight on the coast these days there was still a buzz finding one in an area where they hadn't been seen before. A further four marsh tits was seen or heard on the walk back along with a male bullfinch and treecreeper.
With work starting again next week hopefully I should be able to get Norton 2020 up and running at last
Wet area viewed from the bridge
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| This area used to be cattle grazed up until a few years ago and held breeding lapwing. With a lack of grazing the area is turning into a fen |
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| Marsh tit wet woodland |
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| Wet woodland |
