Category: Birds

UPDATE: 5th November 2025, as I understand it from RSPB’s Rachel there are 85 Cranes on the Ouse Washes. 7th November, 83 reported on Welney.

UPDATE: 21st October 2023 68 now being reported at RSPB Ouse Washes

UPDATE: Species numbers seem to be on the up in East Anglia, with 60+ now as opposed to the 38 or so I first mentioned in the region. Spotted two at RSPB Ouse Fen (Earith) on the dogwalkers’ trail on 17th March 2022, having had a tipoff from Andy Hoy who had seen them on that patch several times for the preceding week or so.

Given this blog post’s title, if you didn’t know me better you might have thought I was going to discuss the interminable civil engineering and construction work that is going on in our vicinity – the construction of the new town of Northstowe and the widening of the A14 road.

But, no the topic is the avian Crane – specifically, the Common Crane (Grus grus). The bird whose scientific name simply means Crane crane, coming from the Latin for crane, funnily enough. It’s another tautonym where that means the name is doubled up to represent the archetype of the family.

Anyway, there are several dozen Common Cranes that spend their time flying between various sites and their surroundings around East Anglia – Namely: RSPB Lakenheath, WWT Welney, RSPB Nene Washes and RSPB Ouse Washes, RSPB Ouse Fen, RSPB Fen Drayton Lakes, Kingfisher’s Bridge Nature Reserve and nearby NT Wicken Fen. Presumably, once airborne, these large and graceful birds can survey a large area of the flatlands and head for whichever patch of wetland they fancy for any given period. I’ve seen them and photographed them from a distance at several of the spots mentioned above.

The largest number I’ve seen at one time is 37, I believe, but proper birders tell me that there are some 45 around and that there may well be at least one courting pair, which is good news for a species that was extirpated from the British Isles by the 17th Century. There is also a tiny breeding population in the Norfolk Broads and the bird was reintroduced to the Somerset levels in 2010.

Today, at least two were dithering about which direction to take over RSPB Ouse Fen (which nestles between the South Cambridgeshire villages of Needingworth, Bluntisham, and Over. It’s a converted gravel quarry site split in two by the River Great Ouse (a tautonym itself given that ouse simply means river, as does the word avon). A large part of this patch land is still active quarry, presumably providing gravel and sand for the aforementioned construction work.

I was walking the Reed Bed Trail, which is on the Over side of the river. Having seen 4-5 Marsh Harriers, a Snipe, and a Green Sandpiper, I was heading back to the car when a couple of birds almost as big as swans came into view, veering back and forth until they went out of sight. They were Common Cranes. Anyway, you might spot these large birds flying over any of the countless fens as they hop between feeding grounds and putative nesting sites.

Not to be confused with that far more common fenland icon, the Grey Heron (Ardea cinerea).

 

UPDATE: 22 Apr 2019, I wasn’t there but apparently, still Shorties at Burwell Fen.

Short-eared Owls (Asio flammeus) like to spend their winters where it’s slightly warmer than their native lands of Iceland, Scandinavia, and Russia. I say warmer, they migrate to northern, eastern, and parts of central southern England especially around the coast. But, they also seem to have favoured NT Burwell Fen this winter.

Got quite close to the Owl photographed above without spooking it, but there was a group of people up ahead who had an even better view when it landed right in front of them, but they decided to blunder ahead and get even closer than 20 metres for their photos, scaring the bird and ruining everybody else’s chance for a closeup.

There have been sightings of six or so Short-eared Owls over the last few weeks. I have seen at most two at one time there in the last few days, but possibly a third. Other photographers and birders there suggest only two remain. They will only be here for a few more days, maybe weeks, the weather and food source will perhaps dictate how much longer they will stay.

I haven’t yet been to see the Snipe (Gallinago gallinago) living on the edge of our village pond, but a visit to RSPB Fen Drayton today allowed us good views of a pair roosting and then feeding on the little islands right in front of the Coucher Hide there.

This species is incredibly well camouflaged in its normal environment. I spotted the first of two, Mrs Sciencebase the second. A fellow birder couldn’t quite home in on the places we’d seen them until the birds began to move to feed with their classic sewing machine bill action. Not to be confused with the Jack Snipe, which has shorter legs, a shorter bill, is a little smaller, and has more detailed and stronger markings but lacks the central yellow stripe on the crown of its head.

Here’s a shot from the hide of the more distant of the two Snipe we saw. This image is as it came out of the camera, uncropped, with no sharpening or processing, other than to resize for the web to reduce file load. Spot the Snipe!

The bird gives its name to the term sniper in reference to how British soldiers in the 18th Century used to hunt the species in India.

I made a start on a bird book, but there are so many around, it seemed like a futile effort, once I’d done a bit of due diligence and spoken to my publisher. My plan was originally for a nice, bright and glossy, book of full-colour plates, but they’re expensive to repro in print. The unique selling point (USP), aside from my photos, was to be discussion of the etymology of the different birds’ names, their recognised names, their folk names, and their scientific names. But, then I found and read Stephen Moss’s excellent book Mrs Moreau’s Warbler, which basically covered it.

So, here, in part-work form are the first few chapters from the sampler of what was to be Chasing Wild Geese – Spotting your first 100 birds. Apologies if you put your name down for a more positive update regarding a hardback, unless somebody wants to take up the option this book may never materialise. That said, my list is up to well over 100 birds now, so I could add new chapters over the coming months if there’s enough interest.

Chasing Wild Geese – PDF sampler version with bonus chapter about the author

Preface -  Scopelessly in love with birds
Chapter 1 -  Robin
Chapter 2 -  Barn Owl
Chapter 3 -  Blackbird
Chapter 4 -  Wren
Chapter 5 -  Red Kite
Chapter 6 -  Kingfisher
Chapter 7 -  Mute Swan
Chapter 8 -  Blue Tit
Chapter 9 -  Kestrel
Chapter 10 – Yellowhammer
Chapter 11 – Linnet
Appendix -  Birding Glossary

 

TL:DR – Birds you might see or here in an English country garden. My Cambridgeshire garden ticklist is below.

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Some time ago, my dear friend and fellow bigMouth singer John Stanford asked me to put together an article for our village newsletter about the birds we are likely to see in our gardens here in South Cambridgeshire. Your mileage will vary depending on where you are in the country, what kind of habitat your garden offers, feeders you use or don’t (it’s not essential and not always recommended). But, I do have an article on how to attract more birds to your garden.

Of course, which of our feathered friends turns up in your garden is down to many different factors, the size and layout of your garden, tree and other plant species, the presence of cats, whereabouts you are relative to patches of woodland, farmland, and whether or not the visitors find a useful supply of food in the form of berries on your bushes, seed feeders and bird tables, coconut shells full of suet, and whatever else you might put out to attract them.

Some birds will arrive in great numbers to feast on fatballs for instance. Most of us have been perplexed to see expensive fatballs disappear in a matter of minutes when a flock of starlings turn up. Other food, such as nyjer seeds in a specialist feeder will draw in Goldfinches and occasionally for some Redpolls. Sunflowers seeds with the husk intact, sometimes referred to as black sunflower hearts, will keep Greenfinches, Blue Tits, Great Tits, Coal Tits, and Long-tailed Tits busy, and if the nyjer seeds run out the Goldfinches too.

Robins, Blackbirds, Wood Pigeons, Collared Doves, Dunnocks, will spend much of their time pecking around under the feeders, although the Blackbirds will join Mistle and Song Thrushes plucking insects from the lawn. And, Thrushes will famously grab snailshells and smash them on the ground to get at the occupant. If it’s very cold out on the farmland, the winter thrushes – the Fieldfares and Redwings – will come into the warmer more urban areas and attempt to snaffle berries from your bushes and trees much to the consternation of the Blackbirds who will attempt to make them flee.

You might also spot Bramblings during the winter. They are another finch resembling the Chaffinch but brighter and more orange colours. I have heard from people living on the edge of our village who see them in their gardens occasionally, but they are more likely to be elsewhere.

Unusual but increasingly common in the winter are Blackcaps, a type of warbler normally considered a summer visitor, but turning up in our gardens from Germany and Eastern Europe rather than heading to the Iberian Peninsula and North Africa. Speaking of summer, by the time you read this birds that you might see above your garden or heading into your eaves may have started to arrive: House Martins first, then the Swallows that don’t necessarily a summer make, and finally the Swifts. Listen out for Cuckoos too. Certainly, houses on the edge of our local village green backing on to farmland have regular cuckoos visiting for the breeding season.

If you have ants among your plants, you might see Green Woodpeckers, also known as Yaffles for their scoffing call in flight. Ants are the staple diet of yaffles, so hold off the powder if you want to see them pecking at the ground in your garden. And, speaking of woodpeckers, there are quite a few Great Spotted Woodpeckers around, which will often come to garden feeders. Of course, if you’re attracting lots of small songbirds to your garden you might also attract predators including Sparrowhawks and less obviously egg-eating Magpies, and chick-chomping Jays. Great Spotted Woodpeckers will also peck into birdboxes to eat baby Blue Tits and the like.

Here’s our garden ticklist of the 60 species we’ve noted) during the last quarter of a century, in, over, or very close to our small, relatively “sub-rural” garden. Some of the species we see often, many less frequently, I’ve added notes if there was something interesting about a particular appearance:

Merlin pickups, for some can hear bird on recording

I could add a lot of other birds to this list if I were to consider my village sightings rather than just my garden sightings: Little Owl (farm next to Les King Wood), Great White Egret (Cottenham Lode), Little Egret (Cottenham Lode), Whooper Swan (Fen Bridge Farm and behind Smithy Fen), Corn Bunting (Broad Lane), Peregrine (Rampton Spinney and Broad Lane farmland), Kingfisher (Cottenham Lode), Black-winged Stilt (Smithy Fen Flood), Little Stint (Smithy Fen Flood), Little Ringed Plover (Smithy Fen Flood), Snipe (Smithy Fen Flood), Teminck’s Stint (Smithy Fen Flood), White Stork (Smithy Fen Flood), Grey Wagtail (Smithy Fen Flood), Red-legged Partridge (farmland).

Check out my tongue-in-beak birding glossary here.

I’d consider this a quite rare sighting over our usual Rampton (Cambridgeshire) stamping ground but we saw a large hawk flying over a sheep-laden field adjacent to the spinney. Looked like a big Sparrowhawk (Accipiter nisus) and indeed that is what it is. Not a Goshawk (Accipiter gentilis), wrong underwing patterning, apparently.

One of my RSPB bird books actually describes the Goshawk species as “essentially a giant version of the Sparrowhawk” but also points out that a large female Sparrowhawk would be about the same size as a small male Goshawk. Both birds are adapted for the same niche: hunting prey on the wing in woodland. So, not a new one for us, after all; we’ve had Sparrowhawks in the garden nomming on the tits).

Several birders I’ve bumped into over the last couple of years have mentioned Lynford Arboretum in Norfolk as being a good place to see Hawfinches, Crossbills, Siskins, Firecrests, Bullfinches, and other bird species. We took a trip there on a very grey day (which means high ISO, noisy photos) and so quite a few bird species but no Firecrests, no Crossbills and no Hawfinches, unfortunately.

On the list of 26 species we did see were, in no particular order:

1. Nuthatch
2. Marsh tit
3. Brambling
4. Chaffinch
5. Wood pigeon
6. Redwing
7. Rook
8. Fieldfare
9. Robin
10. Long-tailed tit
11. Blue tit
12. Great tit
13. Coal tit
14. Goldcrest
15. Siskin
16. Mute swan
17. Gadwall
18. Coot
19. Canada goose
20. Chicken
21. Moorhen
22. Mallard
23. Blackbird
24. Wren
25. Dunnock
26. Bullfinch

It’s honestly not worth my sharing the Goldcrest, Nuthatch, Siskin or any of the others, such a photon-compromised day.