Midlands Birding Blog

With an end to restricted travel getting closer every day, I'm sure everyone reading this is keen to get out and spread their birding wings. I know I certainly I am. But to avoid you wishing away these next few weeks or months, my post this week is going to be a series of 'Low Carbon Birding Challenges', to make the most of our local birding scene before we can all travel further afield, and before some of us forget about the spots that we've grown to love over the last year. A Lockdown Birding Bucket List Top 10 if you will.  Hopefully, it might help us to rekindle our love for our local area, a love which might have worn quite thin over the last few months of being forced to visit it exclusively every day! I hope this highlights a few positives that we can take away from this past year of enforced local lockdown birding, and maybe some that we can continue to enjoy after lockdown and beyond. If there are any you haven't done already, there's still time to give...

I finished last week on 66 species, far surpassing my expectations. At the end of the last post , I wondered what other surprises were in store for the patch this year, but I didn't expect the first one to come so soon. After a walk with my family on the 9th we drove over the Staunton Harold Reservoir road bridge on our way home. From the fleeting view I got from the moving car, I thought I saw the Ring-Necked Duck with the Tufties. The bird had been present from late December through to the 2nd of January, at which point it had moved to nearby Foremark and not been seen again. Obviously, from this fleeting view I didn't really trust my instinct and assumed it must have been a Tufted Duck seen at speed. I presumed the bird must be long gone, with no sightings at Staunton Harold for at least a week. I had been back a few times in the days in between and had no sign, and many others had done the same. The following day, I walked back to the area, which has been so productive for ...