On my way to the recording studio today I had a specific target in mind - Woodcock. They are always more prevalent in cold weather – whether they come from further north in Epping Forest to the temperate plains of Wanstead, or whether they are always in Wanstead but are forced into the open more, who can say? There have been a couple of patch sightings this year already, including one on Sunday night. As I crossed into what we call the boggy bit, I was amazed to see a Woodcock launch itself out from the base of a small tree and bomb off low and west without repetition, hesitation or deviation. This was blind luck – only the third Woodcock I’ve ever seen here, but I’d like to think I was talking it up, working the magic. Sometimes it pays to be cocky. Pretty momentous morning actually, with 1300+ Redwing and 180+ Fieldfare all heading south-west in the 45 minutes that I spent on the Flats.
New total 74 / 69.16%
Cheers
Derek
bloody hell sheila, you is an unstoppable force just now! Cold weather movements are very exciting, and I'm pretty jealous as its 12 degrees over here just now, hotter in the sun, and yesterday we had our lunch outside!
ReplyDeleteThe best cold weather movement I've ever seen was 2 winters ago in early Jan - amayzing it was! You can read about it here, in case you missed it first time round...
http://www.surfbirds.com/community-blogs/colinb/2010/01/09/now-thats-what-i-call-vis-mig-and-a-patch-tick/
That must have been quite a morning! You cannot beat patch birding. I'm still smiling today about Sunday!
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