I think
disappointing would best sum up the last three months at Sutton Bonington. Lots of effort, lots of seed used, but few birds caught. We could blame part of it on the weather, far too mild, often breezy and sometimes wet but the main concern was the enormous amount of seed used with few small birds coming in to the feeders when we were there. We have put this down to squirrels and/or corvids rifling through the seed at the feeders, scattering most on to the floor and this being ‘hoovered’ up by the many pheasant, partridge, duck, pigeons and even more corvids. We have a plan to combat this next winter but with little to show from the last couple of visits we closed the site down on 24 March. The teams during this period comprised Gary, Mick T, Duncan, Alex, Tom, Alice, Ellen, Iona, Sarah, Sophie, me and a visit by Nabegh on 20 January.
We did have a few good birds sighted on our visits including Red Kites a couple of times including one that landed in the field only a few metres from where we were sitting.
The meagre totals were 198 including 89 retraps, made up of (new/retrap): Great Spotted Woodpecker 2/0, Woodpigeon 1/0, Carrion Crow 1/0, Jackdaw 1/0, Redwing 1/0, Blackbird 7/3, Robin 8/8, Meadow Pipit 1/0, Dunnock 4/3, Coal Tit 0/2, Blue Tit 11/31, Great Tit 4/6, Long-tailed Tit 7/6, Chaffinch 14/6, Greenfinch 9/1, Linnet 1/0, Lesser Redpoll 3/0, House Sparrow 1/0, Reed Bunting 16/9, Yellowhammer 17/16. The oldest retraps were from 2016.
Kev
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