Hawfinch.

There's been a massive influx of Hawfinches into the UK this autumn and Cheshire has had its fair share with flocks of up to a dozen being reported. Everyone around me seemed to be adding Hawfinch to their patch lists but despite many hours diligently searching the skies and with my ears tuned in there wasn't even a sniff!

With a family wedding Saturday, at which I was best man, there wasn't going to be anytime to continue the hunt this weekend! Sitting in bed at 6.45 am Saturday morning, with a mug of tea and browsing the news on the iPad before contemplating cooking scrambled eggs and smoked salmon for the bride-to-be and chief bridesmaids breakfast, I heard a familiar call. Jan nearly spilt her tea as I yelled 'Hawfinch' and leapt to the window. There it was sat at the top of a black poplar tree in our back garden! Grabbing the handily placed binoculars I watched it calling softly to itself before rushing to grab the camera for a record shot........ It flew whilst I was out the room.

This was only my 2nd Hawfinch in Cheshire following a showy bird at Marbury Country Park in January 2009 - see here

We had a couple more garden visitors that did actually stay long enough for a photo.