A Birdwatch first but a few noteable absentees

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9am and I sat down at the table in the Conservatory to do this years Big Garden Birdwatch, and set the laptop up so I could watch yesterdays episode of Winterwatch at the same time - was going to say killing two birds with one stone but I dont think that is quite appropriate in these circumstances! 

First, up in the trees were 6 woodpigeon and 6 greenfinches, so that was the total score for them though  some did also visit the bird feeders during the hour. A magpie then joined them and the finches flew off.

I had to wait 10 minutes before any birds came on the feeders and to my surprise, they were two house sparrows!  In the past 30 years I have never had any in the garden, although they have been seen on the roof tops,  and this was the second time I had seen them visiting the garden in the past couple of weeks so a big tick for two of those.

It was quite breezy so I wondered if that would make a difference to visiting bird but soon there was some fluttering and movement around the trees and hedges and I counted two dunnocks,  3 chaffinches ( there were 4 as I counted two male and two female but this is not allowed for on BGG) and 3 blackbirds.

The hour was almost up with no sign of any tits or collared doves but just in time, a great tit appeared and I was able to add it to my list.

So 24 birds of 8 species.  (I did take some pictures but not great through glass)

 





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