Chiltern Birder

As we often do on the Spring Bank Holiday we visited Bampton in Oxfordshire. The lack of swifts over the village was noticeable during the day. On one occasion a grand total of three flew overhead. Then just before five the sky seemed to explode with them although numbers still seemed low when I tried to count, not an easy process as they insist on moving all the time. In previous years I have regarded this as very much on the edge of the range of the Chiltern red kites but this time there were several individuals over the village for most of the time. I was also lucky today to see one perched on a lamp post on Gore Hill in Amersham. You seldom have an opportunity to see the bird in a context that gives you a true guide to its size. On the same journey a kestrel was, sadly, an unusual sight for me hovering over the roundabout by the Beaconsfield motorway services.

Looking back over previous posts this seems to be the normal time to hear a cuckoo in the hills around here. Walking across the field between Broomstick Lane and Cowcroft Wood I could hear one in the direction of Tylers Hill Road. In the woods the bluebells were making a magnificent show but birds could only be heard rather than seen. In the garden we seem to be getting starlings, blue, great and coal tits, blackbirds, robins and dunnocks. Magpies have started coming into the garden and a pair of wood pigeons seem to be resident rather than just visiting.

Between Sunday and Thursday the bluebells have come out. Walking in Cowcroft Wood at the weekend the bluebells were all still green but driving back from Cheinies yesterday there were lovely displays in the woods and verges. I saw several herons along the Chess but no egrets. At home the balance of species at the feeders has changed. A magpie now comes and uses the fat feeder every day while starling numbers are increasing. The blackcap hasn't returned from some time and the long tailed tits seem to have moved on as well. We are still seeing blue and great tits and a coal tit made several visits today. A wood pigeon using the starling feeder was quite amusing while various small brown birds flitting rapidly in and out of shrubs may have been house sparrows.