Yesterday the volunteers did a grand job of putting in some fencing by Ivy South Hide and trimming back buddleia. It was very pleasing to get a few more jobs done and thankfully the rain held off until we finished working.
Birds reported yesterday:
Woodland areas: marsh tit, bullfinch, redwing, siskin, redpoll, goldcrest
Ivy lake: bittern 2, great-white egret, green sandpiper 2, kingfisher
Ibsley Water: Red-crested pochard, goosander 19
Some brilliant bird notes in the Ivy North Hide log book yesterday.
At least two marsh tits seem to be frequenting the woodland around the site workshops as I keep hearing them while I have been servicing our chainsaws and strimmers. Groups of siskin and redpoll all seem to be feeding high in the woodland canopy on alder and birch seed at the moment rather than coming down to the bird feeders, but this will probably change later in the winter when they start to run out of tree seeds. There also seems to be masses of goldcrests around searching for small insects amongst the leaves and bark of the willows and birches.
Ibsley Water had the usual large numbers (several thousand) of gulls turning up from 3.30pm onwards, but even more impressive was the huge murmuration of starlings at 4.20 pm. They first began gathering in uncountable numbers on the other side of the A338 over Somerley Lake before swirling around over Ibsley Water. I can only guess at how many but I would of said at least 8000 -10,000. Of course these pictures don’t really do the amazing spectacle justice, I fully recommend a visit to any of the three Ibsley Water hides from 3pm at the moment.
Starlings!
This is just part of the huge flock.
Weeds in the way, I took this picture from the car park.
Coming closer in the fading light.
Blashford Lakes Nature Reserve 