Chiltern Birder

I took a trip to the Forest of Dean yesterday. I didn't do any research on where would be best but simply used my own judgement from the map. Within 15 minutes of home I had my first interesting sighting when a hare ran out into the road. She had clearly been to the pheasant school of road safety as she stopped and then turned round and went back the way that she had come. It was my first hare for quite a few years and the first in Bucks. I parked at Cannop Ponds, at first it just looked like the typical collection of mallard, tufty and coot but then I spotted some mandarin ducks. I hadn't been aware of the colony in the area until looking it up afterwards. As well as on the lake I explored the marshy ground below the dam and spotted another pair. Walking south along the old railway it did rather feel as if I had wandered into Center Parcs as it all seemed so manacured. I only had a couple of hints that I was on a railway track at all. This solit...

Yesterday I took advantage of an overcast morning to visit the College Lake reserve near Tring. The advantage of the cloud cover is the lack of reflected sunlight on the water so you can actually see the birds rather than just silhouettes. There were good displays of primroses around the edges of the paths but the most spectacular feature was the acrobatic display flights by the lapwings. There are quite a few pairs nesting on the islands so there were usually several birds in the air at the same time. There was the usual collection of waterfowl with shoveller, gadwall, tufties, mallard, coot, mute swans and both Candada and greylag geese. Remarkably well camoflaged on the shingle were some redshank, I could hear them but it was only when one took flight that I could find them and even then once I took my bins off the spot I couldn't be sure of finding them again. At home the badgers are still visiting but catching them on camera is still not as exciting as seeing one in the...