Saturday and Sunday 11th and 12th February

Marsh Tit (c) Andy Last

Marsh Tit (c) Andy Last

Water Rail (c) P. Barker

Water Rail (c) P. Barker

One of the Songthrushes (c) P. Barker

One of the Green Woodpeckers (c) P. Barker

Very tame Bullfinch (c) Peter Barker

A bitterly cold weekend but by Sunday there were at least some signs of a thaw.
There were few birds to be seen on Saturday after what had had been one of the coldest nights of the winter so far, apart from the usual tits, finches and buntings around the feeders. Among these was a Marsh Tit. There were very few ducks on the ice, and on the northern lagoon there was just a tiny open lead of water with just a pair of Mute swans keeping it open accompanied by a lone Coot.
By the bridge to the hide a Water Rail could be seen out and about feeding in the running water and on Sunday there were two visible at the same time.
We saw a Woodcock in long meadow on Saturday morning and another two were seen on Sunday over the reedbed and Greenaways. There were about forty Golden Plover feeding on Ashgrave and the closes as the thaw began to set in on Sunday. There were also good numbers of Fieldfares foraging over the grass now that the berries supply in the hedgerows is exhausted. There were also several Mistle Thrushes amongst them. At least seven Song Thrushes were collecting snails from the long grass on the southern side of the hide and then smashing them against the stones on the path. Nine Green Woodpeckers were in July's meadow and soon they will be staking their claims to territory in Sling copse and Noke wood. There were already woodpeckers drumming in the wood and from the path we could see a Nuthatch working through a large oak.
Back in the carpark field a normally very shy Bullfinch gave very close views as it fed on blackthorn buds.