TQ81 R (South of Pett)
5th January 2008, Saturday
The Winter Atlas now requires a “late visitâ€, so I’m returning to the sites I first looked at in early November. Guess what? Not much change. There’s not much reason for it; the weather has remained mild so birds have had plenty to eat in the fields, hedges, woods and gardens of the Marsham Valley. As a result, my counts of little birds like Wren, Robin, Dunnock. Blue & Great Tit were very similar.
Blackbird numbers remain high, and cold weather further north must have pushed more Redwings into the area. A couple have been feeding on our lawn this week while more have accompanied a small herd of Mistle Thrushes on the field behind us. The two species are at opposite ends of the spectrum of British thrushes, the bigger one pallid and rangy, the smaller warm, dark and compact.
Many of the small farms in this valley provide facilities for horse-riding. The outbuildings, small paddocks, sheltering hedgerows, dung-heaps and muddy corners provide, in their turn, facilities for thrushes, finches,wagtails and magpies.
One noticeable change is in the garden birds. With the solstice hehind them, Collared Doves, and Greenfinches are back in the village evergreens, while Starling flocks swirl overhead and House Sparrows chirrup from the gutters, surprisingly hard to count.
Another surprise was the concentration of Moorhens around a little stream, ponds and lawns at 875129, which has increased from 14 in November to 29 on Friday. I think that numbers of Moorhens in this area have increased enormously in recent years, so that substantial numbers are now present in any number of out-of-the-way corners.
Unlike those belonging to the Woodland Trust (Guestling) and National Trust (Market, Stumblets), this wood has been neglected and the Sweet Chestnut coppice has not been cut for years. As a result, the trees have become top-heavy, the stools splitting apart like this one ot the whole tree toppling over like the one below.
Other people have seen Ravens (actually only one?) recently, but I had seen none since October until one croaked its way over Rosemary Lane. It wasn’t really “using†the square, so I couldn’t count it, as much as I would like something more exotic on the list, but a Peregrine cruising down the valley ticks the box because it was searching for prey…
