Marston, and another oddity.

19/11/2014

A very interesting couple of hours on the patch this afternoon. my favourite bird of the day was a male reed bunting with a white head and some white on the rump! These funny-plumaged specimens never cease to fascinate me, this was a new species for my list.

I couldn’t locate the pale looking chiffchaff that I saw the other day, but I did find one with the tit flock. I really don’t know which sub species/form it belongs to. It seemed to me to be very ‘warm’ looking with a distinct, buffy superscillium, brownish ear coverts and very dark legs. The back was buffy, not greenish like the ones that were here in summer. ( Note to Marston regulars, (( with good cameras)), take pics of any chiffys you see this winter).

On the way back home I noted five buzzards, worming in the field opposite the paddocks at Barkston. The large one in the pic below was doing it’s best to look like a rough-legged but didn’t quite succeed. As I pulled up to look at them a stonechat flew up from the edge of the ditch.