New sighting for our garden

Had a nice surprise this morning with a great sighting of a female brambling in the garden on the feeders, stayed for a good 5 mins before disapearing - never returned once I got my 'proper' bins out but the 'standby' bins were good enough for a clear ID. Usual crowd of GS woodpeckers, bullfinch, greenfinch, tits etc but always good to see something new visiting. Still getting infrequent visits from Nuthatch and also had a first sighting of a green woodpecker in the trees at the bottom of the garden during the worst of the snow. Looking forward to seeing what spring brings
:-)

BTO Atlas Withens Clough East SD92W

Just managed to get this last visit in before the deadline. Square includes east part of the res up to Sunderland Pasture and down to the Hinchcliffe:

No Meadow Pipits or Skylarks yet on the walk over past Stoodley Pike.

Goldeneye - 2 (male and female)
Greylag Goose - 2
Canada Goose - 3
Mallard - 4
Pheasant - 4
Mistle Thrush
Robin - 5
Wren -2
Blue Tit - 12
Great Tit - 12
Coal Tit
Nuthatch (singing)
Stonechat (female)
Greenfinch - 7
Chaffinch - 7
Crow - 5
Magpie - 3
Reed Bunting - 3












On the walk back home-
Dipper on the stream under Dauber Bridge, Cragg Vale
Dipper singing on River Calder by the old Walkleys Clogs
Grey Heron
Pied Wagtail - 15 at Eastwood Sewage Works
Grey Wagtail - 2 at Eastwood Sewage Works
BH Gull - 53 at Eastwood Sewage Works
Jackdaw - c. 35 at Eastwood Sewage Works
Long Tailed Tit - 7 at Callis Bridge
lots of Mallards and Canada Geese 0n Rochdale Canal.

Ring-billed Gull Video

Okay, I uploaded the Mirfield Ring-billed Gull Video overnight and can be seen here -

http://thebaldibis.blogspot.com/

Enjoy.

Todays reports

From SG - Redshank and Oystercatcher this morning at Ringstone Res'r

The Ring-billed Gull is still at Mirfield (just outside our recording area!) - Sand Lane Gravel Pits

23 Skylark at Swales Moor (Ringby Lane) and a possible Snow Bunting earlier but not re-found to confirm the possible sighting by IG

Some Lapwings are also back on territory - displaying this morning near Pike End - Rishworth

Pink feet

Distant shot of the 4 pink footed geese in the field next to Longfield Dam, Todmorden. One briefly entered the water, but got back out quickly.

Thebaldibis Blog

Just a quickie to let you that I've set up the Baldibis blog at http://thebaldibis.blogspot.com/. The blog will deal with more general natural history and conservation topics and will feature video clips that I would not normally put on the You Tube channel (such as short clips of local birds). It's early days, but if you add it to your list of "Blogs I Follow", I'm sure you'll like what you see. Cheers, Steve.

Elland GP

We called in for a look at Elland GP this afternoon with Nick D following a mid afternoon search at Mirfield - Sand Lane GP where a 3rd year Ring-billed Gull has been over at least the last 3 days. We missed out, though we hear it did turn up 20 mins after we left the site! This is only about 2 miles from our recording area so there is a chance of a new bird for Calderdale if it drifts up the valley towards Brighouse/Elland!

Elland GP
3 Goldeneye (1 drake)
1 Tufted Duck
c15 Goosander
c10 Cormorant
1 L B B Gull
1 Herring Gull

Clifton,Brighouse & Hove Edge

Fields N of Jay House Lane:
150+ Golden Plover
100+ Lapwing
80 Common Gulls
30 Crows/Rooks/Jackdaws in a mixed flock
In the nearby wood:
G S Woodpecker, Kestrel and 10 Goldcrests

Canal in Brighouse: 82 Mallard - down from 120+ last week

Coach Road:
Lone Heron in middle of the field, along with 12 Magpies
6 Goosanders flew in to the small lake on the golf course (the lake is one of few features left of Titus Salts estate before he moved on to bigger things at Saltaire !)
2 Jays
Nuthatch calling
Usual Wrens, Tits and Chaffinches

Mill Bank

A pair of Dippers on the stream at Mill Bank bridge yesterday evening. First sighting this year. Last year they fledged two young then moved off, presumably back down to the Ryburn valley.

school

i was just in the libary at 11.00 when suddenly a gull flew by. i have seen many gulls around here, infact there is a large flock which roost on the roof. however this gulls head was compleatly black, not in winter plumage, and its bill was bold red. it has since followed me round all day. having not had any kit on me i can nopt say for sure what it was but, i do think that it could be a med gull. if anyone wants to check it out my school is the north halifax grammar school. i have read up on med gulls and bh gulls so know what i'm looking for tomorrow, if it sticks around, which it will being grounded by the snow, but feel free to have a look.

New Heronry ?

New to me, anyway.
Three nests, two with sitting herons this afternoon at Triangle.
Opposite bus shelter no.450 on Oldham Rd., look over the wall. The trees are down by the stream. The bus shelter is just out of the 40mph zone, going to Ripponden from Sowerby Bridge.
There is a possibility of views and photos into the nests, though there is a screen of twigs in front of them.

Woodpecker's tongue - Jumble Hole today

Not a great quality shot, but you can see this GS woodpecker 'licking its lips' after it fed on the fat balls. Click on the photo for a large image.

Calder Valley

We had a walk along the canal betwen Hebden Bridge and Salterhebble today.
Surprised not to find any Redwings/Fieldfares/Siskin or Redpoll ! To make up for it a female Sparrowhawk was hunting along the canal and flushed 2 Blackbirds and a big female Peregrine went high over Luddenden towards Sowerby
2 Great Spotted Woodpeckers around Mytholmroyd
1 Dipper at Luddenden
32 Teal, 2 Coot, 2 Grey Herons and 1 Snipe at High Royd
c250 Mallard along the length of the canal

Waxwings Nill, Goosander Four

A quick sortie around the retail parks and other Waxwing hotspots with Nick D this afternoon produced a big fat zero. There are so few berries left on any of the trees and shrubs that any Waxwings that do turn up are likely to pass through very quickly.

Elland turned up Nuthatch calling on the far side of the fishing pool, 3 Great crested grebes on the ski lake, 6 siskins along the canal, 2 pairs of Goosander which I managed to film displaying, an aberrant Tufted Duck, a female Bullfinch by the car park where there were loads of robins, tits, dunnocks and chaffinch, a few cormorants, mallard, moorhen.

Cool Gadgets

Maplin are currently selling off Binatone Latitude 100 2-way radios at £12/pair. I bought a pair during the week and tried them out with Nick D this weekend at Ogden and at Elland. Very useful in allowing folk to keep in touch when doing systematic searches of an area. Range is up to 3kms.

Thanks Sean!

As many of you will know we are shortly to lose Sean Gray from our area, I didn't want his leaving to pass without thanking him publicly for all he has done for birds, birding and indeed birders over the time he has been in Calderdale. He has contributed in many ways not least with his ringing work which has included a large input to the Twite recovery project, operating regular ringing sites at Ringstone and Cooper Bridge and of course ringing Tree Sparrows at Jay House Lane. On top of this I think our local photographers will agree his skills and quality of work are outstanding and he has freely made this available to the CBCG for use in fund raising, calendars etc as well as in the local bird report. As well as losing both a ringer and photographer we are also losing a great personality who has helped build bridges with several local landowners enabling projects such as those at Ringstone and Jay House Lane to take place. Birding needs more characters and we are certainly losing one locally in Sean.

Thanks for all you have done Sean and best wishes to you, Nikki and family in your new life in the Isle of Man, keep in touch!

Heads Up For Smew 'n' Stuff

Just outside our area, there have been several reports of Smew kicking about, and a few Ring-necked Ducks, Red-necked Grebes and Red-breasted Mergansers, so keep an eye on your waters. That is, if it ain't all iced up.

Waxwings Stuck (?) in Finland

Latest reports from EBN are that Waxwings are completely absent from Romania this winter, and there have only been a few scattered sightings in Moscow so far. Finland has around 8000 repoerts.
However, 20 were at Midhope on 14th, 2 in Leeds on 15th, 1 in Shipley on 19th (Friday) and 2 near the A629 river bridge at Cross Hills roundabout, Keighley mid-afternoon before flying north yesterday. This local news comes courtesy of Bird Guides.

"Garden tick!"

OK we don't really have a garden so its more a feeder tick but got our first Brambling in over twenty years of living here this morning.

2009 Report

Nick Dawtery has received several reports of Hobby in 2009. If you can send in a description to Nick for these birds seen that would be a big help. Thank you.

Just a reminder too if you have any Calderdale bird photos taken in 2009 then please send in to Nick to consider which ones to include in the report.