After being spoilt rotten by great birds and great weather last Sunday at Kensington Gardens, the weather today was damp, dark and dreary. However seeing several pockets of Snowdrops dotted around Cranford Park lightened my day.....
and the first emerging leaves of Bluebells suggest it's going to be a good season for them too....
The grey skies did not make for any decent bird photos today. A pair of valentine marmite parakeets mating high up in the branches would have been a lovely shot if it wasn't so dark...
Despite the damp weather birds are starting to pair up and investigate potential nesting sites. Late this afternoon I watched a pair of Green Woodpeckers eyeing each other up on a trunk with a good sized nest hole. All of my photos are too dark to publish, but I will revisit the tree again in better weather.
Robins were very vocal today with several pairs being spotted around the woods, graveyard and car park. Jackdaws and Crows are also starting to pair up and there were several largish groups of Magpies chasing each other around. Blue and Great Tits were also vocal and chasing each other.
The Great Tit below was investigating the nest box near the burnt out Info Centre. Each year there's some competition between the Blues and Greats, as to who gets to nest in this box. The loser usually ends up nesting in a hole at the back of the same tree.
Fewy, Sue and Jasper the bird-dog joined me today. There was no sign of either of the Kingfishers, nor the Little Egret and nor the Little Grebes. The river level is quite high again though so the Little Grebes have probably moved further along where there is still some vegetation to hide under.
Fewy and I had two brief glimpses of the male Kestrel by the river and an even briefer glimpse of a low flying Buzzard at the back of Cranford Woods, but I couldn't get photos of either of them.
On Tony James blog post from yesterday he reported recently seeing a large flock of around 200 Lapwings coming up from the field just beyond Frogs Ditch at the back of the woods. I know they have been previously recorded as nesting further down Cranford Lane near the QPR training grounds, and Sue has spotted a couple of Lapwings going over Cranford Park before, but it's a first for me to actually see them whilst at the park.
Fewy, Sue, Jasper and I were stalking 14 Meadow Pipits when we first saw the Lapwing flock go up. It was such a shame the skies were so dark as it was quite a spectacle..
As we watched them flying almost in a murmuration fashion, we noticed the birds at the top of the group were considerably smaller than the Lapwings below, and as they got higher the smaller birds formed their own flock and broke away from the main group...
It was frustratingly hard to identify them against the grey forbidding clouds. Twice they flew over us but at a great height. The larger flock of Lapwings soon resettled on the distant field, but the smaller birds continued to fly high.
After much discussion we think they are Golden Plovers. If they are, that will be another patch tick for me.
The distraction of the Lapwings and possible Plovers meant we lost sight of the 14 Meadow Pipits we had been stalking. We re-located a few of them but they were hidden deep in the longish grass and only gave a couple of tantalising views....
This is a Meadow Pipit.......honestly......
Back at the car park before we all went our separate ways, Fewy poured the coffee as he's been trained to do...and with a healthy slug of whisky in mine......
whilst Jasper the bird-dog finally posed for a photo.....
It was great to see Jasper, I've not seen him for some time as he's been quite poorly. It was lovely to be greeted so enthusiastically by him earlier today (with wagging tail and a little bark), especially as he was diagnosed as being diabetic this week. Obviously his new treatment is working wonders and you could see he was feeling much better. Welcome back Jasps xx
So it may have been a dull weather day, but it was a great company day and I added two new birds to my Cranford Park patch list. It was also really nice to bump into some of the regular dog walkers, who know me by sight now and who are always willing to tell me what they've seen around the park. One of them confirmed he had seen a pair of Kingfishers at the end of last year, and another confirmed he has previously seen Muntjac deer in the park. Considering the parks location (it is surrounded three sides by the M4 motorway, the busy Hayes By-Pass and Heathrow Airport) it shows just what a lovely gem of a place Cranford Park is.
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