Catch-up

Busy, busy. Having not posted for a while, this is a quick catch-up. A couple of recent ringing trips - one to London, so Na could catch up with her old ringing group. The Saturday morning's ringing was pretty decent, with over a hundred birds caught - predominantly Long-tailed Tit and Goldcrest, it seemed (a nice enough portrait of a Goldcrest from that day above). After that we froze our bums off at Staines reservoirs for the fun of it, though there was little enough to see: a handful of Ruddy Duck and a few Goldeneye were the highlight. An evening visit to a local pub for a celebratory birthday dinner with a friend, then the day was capped off with an overnight snowfall... "It always snows on my birthday..." was Na's comment!

Sunday started lazily - pelting with rain, so we stayed in bed and stuffed a late scrambled-egg breakfast; then headed back via Virginia Water (Mandarins, dogs, walkers, screaming kids...) to Exeter, for a week's house-sit whilst my parents sunned themselves in Spain with youngest sister. Uneventful week. Then last weekend we had the annual ringing session in the orchard across the road from the parents' house, in search of Fieldfare. Whilst that was relatively unsuccessful (only one FF), we did catch a good selection of Blackbird, including a bird ringed during the previous session, last November.

Back in Hennock, and the local birds have taken to the feeders on the veranda in a big way - we now have Blackbird, Song Thrush and Robin coming to crumbs on the ground, with a selection of tits, Nuthatch and House Sparrow on the hanging feeders. Garden list hasn't grown much though! Next task is to get some more atlas squares done - of which, more later...