Linacre - 25th March 2017

Luke and I had 2 hours at Linacre this morning. We arrived at 7am and it was bright and sunny, but only minus 1 degrees. When we left at 9am it was still bright and sunny, but the temperature had risen to 7 degrees.

One of the first birds we heard today was a calling Tawny Owl, surprisingly our first Linacre record of 2017. We walked around all 3 reservoirs, and recorded 10 singing Chiffchaffs, 2 Song Thrushes, 2 Mistle Thrushes, Siskin (heard and 2 seen), 4 drumming Great-spotted Woodpeckers, 9 Mandarin Ducks, 36 Mallards, 31 Tufted Ducks, 10 Coots, 9 Moorhens, 6 Great-crested Grebes (3 pairs), 1 Canada Goose, 1 Grey Heron, 2 Grey Wagtails, 3 Black-headed Gulls, 1 "redhead" Goosander, 1 Common Buzzard and 3 Cormorants, including this ringed individual.

Cormorant

As we were heading back to the car we decided to have one last look for Lesser-spotted Woodpecker. No luck unfortunately, but we did stumble on 5 Stock Doves, including a pair that were inspecting a potential nest hole. This not only our highest ever count at Linacre, but also the first time we've seen them near a nest site. Hopefully, I'll be able to report a successful nesting report later in the season.