Nene Again

A beautiful morning once again and I began my day with a quick walk around the Old Village. My target was the Little Egret that has been visiting here for the last few days, I hoped to get a photo, but the bird was AWOL today. One compensation was a large flock of Redwings feeding on the Charter Field, these lovely thrushes are always worth seeing.

River views.

Once again I chose to walk along the Nene but this time I walked along towards Cotterstock and on to Tansor. While the skies were blue the wind was cold and it was hard to stop my eyes watering as I walked. A highlight of the day came soon after arriving at Oundle when a Peregrine was seen close to the north bridge. Raptors were well represented throughout the day with a further four species on view, a male Sparrowhawk showed particularly well. Having given all the passerines in a small wood cause for alarm as it passed through it then set off over the neighbouring fields where it flushed many Fieldfares.

A few of today's birds.

As has been the case on other recent sorties out into the field there was not a whole lot of interest to report. Spring flowers continue to bloom although I've only seen cultivated types so far. In Cotterstock village there were numerous Snowdrops as well as plenty of Winter Aconites while in nearby Tansor I saw a lot of Crocuses. Tansor churchyard had many mature Yews but I could not find any Hawfinches though it could bear further investigation.

Spring flowers and the church at Cotterstock.

Timing is not always a strong point of mine but today I was glad to get to the pub just before the first of several hail showers. It's much better to watch other people battling the nasty conditions while sipping on a pint than it is to face them yourself.

A couple from Oundle.