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Sunday 17 January 2010

Thaw brings the floods

A lot warmer today and nearly all the snow has gone.
I decided to visit Gayhurst Quarry to check on the wildfowl.
As I parked the car a flock of 5 Bullfinches were in the hedge - there seem to be a lot of these around lately.
When I got down to the lakes it seemed there was water everywhere. It was impossible to walk along the bottom of Spinney Pit as the water was so deep, but I did wade through some of it to scan through the large Goose flock. They were mainly Greylags, with some Canadas but also 1 Whitefront, presumably the one recently seen at Newport.
I made my way around to Motorway Pit which being the only unfrozen lake was absolutely heaving with birds. A scan through found a magnificent drake Pintail along with 2 females. There were 166 Mute Swans, but the large numbers of Mallard, Wigeon, Pochard, Tufted, Gadwall, Teal and Shoveler in such a small area made them impossible to count.
A Little Egret, Jay and Buzzard were also seen.

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