First post of the new year!

With my 2nd of 3 exams complted today, i have had a nice off, and have decided to do work on the blog. A week from now, and then i'll be free to upload to the blog as often as i wish. The last few months have been abit hectic fitting in time for everything, and i have always chosen actual 'field time' over blogging about it, trying to make the most of the short days. With the spare time increasing again though now, the blog will start to pick up again!

3/01/13
My first bird of the year came very late in the day (about 3:30pm) as i had spent New Years with my girlfriend. Therefore, my first venture out for a walk around the blog to a small pool, gave me my first bird of the year. A Carrian Crow.....

The first true venture out was a combination of the Webbs/ Upton Warren area. We first dropped into the cafe, which, as two students with dwindling money supplies, we found to be incredibly expensive. I'd much rather have dropped itno the Sailing Pool cafe, but it was closed for the winter (sigh), however, the cheese toastie we had from Webbs was very nice. We vowed to return after.

Then it was onwards to the Moors Pool, where we had a scan, and everything was a tick! Sadly however, the birdlife was fairly limited. 9 Curlew was an increase of 1 on the total i have been seeing throughout the winter, and as the Gulls started overflying northwards, i managed to pick out a adult Great Black-Backed Gull as it flew over with a flock of Herrings and LBBG. As the light slowly started to fade, our time to leave was approaching quickly, but which would come first, us leaving, or the Bittern showing? Time was wearing on, and our limit of 4:25 was very quickly approaching, and, at 4:22, a mere 3 minuites before we had to leave, the call went up saying the BITTERN was showing, i get onto it pritty quickly, and handed my bins to Shan, who also quickly got onto the bird, tucked up in the reeds, but it soon took flight and flew along the northern shore to the north reedbed to roost. And following that, we had to leave, and again visted Webbs.

Considering i hadent seen Bittern for two years, it comes as somewhat of a shock that in the last two weeks alone i had seen the Bittern twice, just showing how easilly your fortunes can change if a local bird decided to turn up and set into a fairly regular pattern.
MB