With Storm Ciara due to hit to-morrow - sounds like Doomsday - we thought we'd better go out to-day. Weekends are usually avoided unless it's to a less frequented area. Lynford Arboretum is very popular always, with both dog walkers and birders, but especially so when the Hawfinches are showing in the Paddocks. Flocks of up to 30+ have been counted.
Parking in the disabled spot inside the arboretum itself makes it a shorter walk.
I admit to apprehension as it's further than I have walked for some time and, the so-called path is either stony or grass or mud.
Kitted up, my camera in the perfect fit bag on the back of the seat, Rolly and I trundled off. The first stop was at the tunnel feeding station, where we had our first Yellowhammer of the year. There were also Brambling, Great and Blue Tits, Nuthatch and Blackbirds present.
Managing about 100 metres - often less - of walking between sit-downs, we then joined the Morrisons who had a Tawny Owl in the scope. I couldn't see it ! High up in a very tall conifer and said to be just behind the trunk with parts of it showing. Another man then offered me his scope and an invitation to change the focus. That did it. I saw a brown-streaked blob. People are very kind.
A longer sit just over the bridge, hoping not to walk as far as the 30+ scoping birders about 50 metres away. No luck. A local dog walker - she had a terrier named Freya - stopped for a chat. White hair and a Rolly brings friendliness. She told me of all the Hawfinches she had seen (!!) as a daily dog walker and then said that the berries must be finished soon. I was able to tell her that it was beech mast on the ground.
I eventually found a space to see THE area, again an immediate offer of a look through a scope - which I turned down with gratitude as I needed to sit. The main flock had gone, I saw at least two birds perched in a tree and one flying away.
A truly dreadful record shot for the year folder. Already a contender for the worst photo of the year.
We missed the spectacle but enjoyed the sighting. It's been a while since we saw this species, the main motivation for the effort. They are a real treat.
Trudging back, Pam still has an achilles problem, every step is a pain, we stopped on the bridge to view the birds coming in to the food scattered on the pillars and ledges. First was a female Reed Bunting, then the smash and grab visit of two Marsh Tits,
Chaffinch
Blue and Great Tits.
Great Spotted Woodpeckers squabbled in a nearby tree, a small flock of Siskins fed in the Alders.
We were both pleased to arrive back at the car for a coffee and a snack before driving to St Helen's.
Eschewing the main car park, we drove on to the layby which has a newly erected ' parking for church goers' sign. Safe to-day. The whole area is very popular. Despite cyclists, ramblers, and birders, Pam spotted a Treecreeper on an old tree trunk dead in front of the car. More through the tinted and graduated windscreen photos.
It's that year folder which makes me do it 😉
Both of us were tired and other birding spots too distant for to-day, we drove home via Thetford Sainsbury's.
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