WHAT'S BUZZING OR FLYING NEAR YOU TODAY - 2017

I think the regular birds here know that our cat has gone (8 months now) and spend more time on the ground and fortunately we hardly get any other cats in.
Early this morning we had Sparrows, a pair of Robins, 1 Blue Tit, 1 Long Tailed Tit, 2 Chaffinches, 6 Goldfinches, Siskins (now 3) 2 Dunnocks, 1 Blackbird and 3 Starlings but the Pied Wagtails haven't been seen today, yet. Not a bad tally in an hour for an urban garden.

 

Mr Kandy and myself drove over to Lynford Arboretum in Thetford Forest (Suffolk) as a last trip out before I am stuck at home for weeks and was hoping to see a rare bird for us called a Hawfinch that we have wanted to see for many years.It only took around 1 1/2hours from home and after parking the car in the free car park we soon spotted the line of twitchers/birders with their cameras/binoculars.We only had to wait around ten minutes before I got my first glimpse of a head up in the branches of a tree.A keen birder owns the strip of land where the birds are and spends a fortune on bird seed to encourage these unusual birds

 

Fantastic shots @Kandy, amazing bird, which I would love to see. As you probably know the huge beak can crush a cherry stone it is so powerful. For a resident bird they are very elusive, the nearest to here would probably be in Hampshire.

 

@strongylodon I didn't realise they can crack cherry stones and never knew that they can be resident in the U.K. There was 10 of these cracking birds yesterday and we saw five but only had three come down to feed.Mr Kandy got better photos with his new camera and lens but I have to rely on my small camera hence the not such good quality photos.There was also a flock of Bramblings feeding on the dropped seed as well.

It has taken us many years to finally see them and we would also like to see a Wallcreeper before we get too

I would hate to have to carry that big lens around with me to capture the birds and this chap spent more time lying on the floor trying to get his shots

 

taken several days ago when it was actually sunny up here.

 

Although this pair of Siskins are here every day now, we don't get Long Tailed Tits very often, the pic is deceiving as the Long Tail is three feet behind the Siskins which are not in focus as I didn't have time to alter the depth of field as the Tit could fly off at any second, unusual to see just one.

 

The Long Tail was back again, briefly and I wondered why just on the Acer Orange Dream, I had a look and found aphids on the opening leaf buds. I won't spray as the leaf buds are too delicate and also it is providing natural food (as long as they regularly come and eat them!).

 

We got a family of them that twitter to themselves as they go round the trees here

Not sure if I just saw a grey or a yellow wagtail, it was more grey than yellow.

 

@Zigs , more likely a Grey which is resident, as Yellows don't usually arrive from Africa until early April and then normally found around horses and cattle.