Patch birding.

This time of year is always slow birding when your patch is an inland site mainly consisting of improved pasture with a few small ponds and copses. I've been out a few times and waded through muddy fields and ditches. Theres  a few species I'd expected to get that seem to have gone AWOL. I've not yet seen Coal Tit or Grey Wagtail but I have already seen Barn Owl (sat on a fence post early one morning a few hundred metres from the house), Snipe (6 flushed from around a reed fringed pond) and Reed Bunting (scarce for some reason here). Coot, Moorhen, Teal and Mallard are all regular on the local ponds but the pond in front of the house has failed to attract big numbers of wildfowl yet although we've had the first Greylag Geese, Canada Geese and Wigeon of the year. The Teal are all hiding on another overgrown local pond thats actually in someones back garden!

Other regulars include Pinkfooted Geese and of course our resident Little Owls which can currently be seen basking in sunny weather from our bedroom window!