A Blustery Patch...

A visit to the local patch this morning in the near gale force south/south westerly wind made finding birds pretty difficult,with few highlights.The best of the bunch was a single Green Sandpiper watched sheltering and feeding in a small drainage ditch alongside the Soak drain,appearing out of one of the decoy ponds and gave good views as it probed about in the water looking for any tasty morsels to eat.Hopefully it will stop to winter,as they are more frequently doing in this country now the climate is warming,the species main wintering area being in tropical Africa.After the Green Sand,i enjoyed fantastic views of a pair of Common Buzzard as they called to each other, a brilliant sound and one of my favourites and i got so close to them i could see the brown iris on both birds confirming them as adults.This is my favourite species of bird and now are more common than Kestrels.There were good numbers of passerines about today and these included a large flock of at least 400 Fieldfare,which gave great views as they raucously chattered along a nearby hedgerow with their 'chack,chack' calls and a flock of 70 Linnet and 100 Goldfinch where mixed in with these,making for a flurry of activity when i flushed them.The only other bird of note was a single female Stonechat,getting buffeted by the wind in the small set-aside field near to the car park.Non-bird highlights today fell to a confiding female Roe Deer,which didn't seem to be bothered by my presence and carried on munching as i passed by,they are such lovely animals,it is such a shame they do so much damage in plantations and become foresters enemies.A good few hrs despite the wind.