Shelduck action

its the time of year when the Shelduck becomes rather more interesting photographically

Blogger photo upload seems to have gone wrong again only able to attach one photo at a time????

the other asio owl

not really surprising that most of the people never saw the male that was displaying above this bird and hence its frequent upward glances but the clown with the squeaky toy presumably thinking he was using good fieldcraft should really get a hobby more suited to his skills and mentality and leave wild birds alone--

Long-eared owls

being in the vicinity I dropped in to have a look at these beautiful owls; my opinion is that Long-eared Owl is in trouble at least around North Lincs -- having checked most of my regular sites in the past couple of weeks I have drawn a complete blank; most are in thorn thickets where in some cases uniformed people have put up boxes that have been taken over by Tawny Owls excluding the Leos in some others the habitat has been preserved while the hunting range outside the thicket has been destroyed by industrial development a classic case of poor quality survey work
In 2009 there were no reports of proven breeding in Lincolnshire and birds were recorded from only 9 sites with most of these being coastal migrants -- the bird is overlooked but even so this is a serious situation --

I was also amazed that these birds stay in this area with the volume of noise from people supposedly enjoying the birds matching the output a local football ground -- what on earth happened to birdwatching  as opposed to walking around shouting and jabbering while following directions to the next bird?

more Mealy Redpolls

several of the Mealies are very grey toned on the uppers with only hints of brown -- their rather drab plumage seems to mirror the grey backdrop of the birch trees and the grey and cold weather

redpoll gradation

an interesting bird from this morning -- could it be an exilipes or is the undertail covert streak too broad and the upper rump too heavily streaked? there is certainly a turnover of birds with 4-5 Lessers present today amongst the Mealies

shots from Alkborough

a female Marsh Harrier with accompanying Shelducks and the first of the spring passage Black-tailed Godwits

the humble Shelduck

a ubiquitous sight on the Humber but none the less attractive for that -- the Humber is of International Importance for the species withe a 5-year WeBS mean of 5300 birds to 2009