MORNING WALK INTO YEO VALLEY
WEATHER: cloudy with sunny spells, light winds. Temp 8C
I am getting out earlier now that it is much lighter in the mornings, today I was out by 8:30am and very soon that will be back to 9:30am as we change our clocks next weekend.
My walk today was the full length of the valley, I walked as far as you can go along the course of the stream and I stood at the bottom for ½ hour of the valley where the stream meets the River Yeo. Along the way I had many encounters with birdlife and I saw quite few bumble bees on the wing and a few flowers are emerging from the grassy banks.
The Chaffinch in full song, what a beautiful bird it is.
I watched a Chaffinch singing and likewise 2 Chiffchaffs were singing on territories. I had one brief view of a Kingfisher as it darted away from. The usual Great Spotted Woodpeckers were drumming and a Song Thrush was in full song, I did see a Mistle |thrush for only the second time this month and a pair of Jays was nice to see.
Common Dog Violet, this is the only bunch I could find in the valley, a nice specimen though.
Back home I sat on my garden bench and watched the activity in the trees and over the meadow. A Goldcrest was once again gathering nesting material from the boughs of the trees by pulling off the lichen and moss growths, a Jackdaw started doing that too! My local Blue Tit who spends a great deal of his time going in and out our bird box spends a lot of time singing from high up in the sycamores and a pair of Long-tailed Tits pass through the garden several times a day.
Lungwort - the flowers start off pink and change to violet-blue. The white speckles on the leaves are supposed to look like lung tissue??
One nice special sighting was of a Greenfinch, it came over the top of our building and landed briefly in the sycamores, but alas it didn’t stay long enough for me to get a picture of it. The best action of the morning was that of a pair of Ravens, they flew into the meadow and upset the local Jackdaws who chased them around for a while.
Jackdaw in the sycamore
The Ravens took no notice of the attention they getting from the Daws, they were far too busy interacting with each over. They performed a lovely variety of aerobatic manoeuvres, I managed to get some video of them and took a few screenshots from that.
the pair of Ravens displaying over the meadow next to our garden
Other birds seen in the garden were the most common species: Great Tit, Robin, Dunnock, Blackbird and Goldfinch, all of the above arrive everyday and most of them are in relationships!!