Colder...but....

It was quite nice to see a frost at last.  I think this is only the fourth time that I have had to scrape at the windscreen and the warm weather has been, from a winter thrush ringing point of view, most unwelcome.
After my last visit a couple of days ago when I managed to ring 19 Redwing, I had high hopes when I left the house this morning with crunchy frost under foot.
At the orchard the frost was just as good.  However, with the ground already water logged just about everywhere in the south east I reckon it will take several days of hard frost to get  the earth 'as hard as iron'.  No such luck at the moment with more rain forecast in the next couple of days to see the year out.  So heres hoping to a cold new year!

The poor number of birds showing in the garden at home at the moment was backed up by the number around the orchard.  In fact it seemed there were less thrushes than before and I caught little today.

Anyway....clear skies early on meant the cooler conditions for frost were good.....

A couple of Song Thrush turned up today with several Redwing.  Both were adults.  Poor old Magpies get the blame for the reduction in numbers of these birds in particular, but the science of ringing and monitoring has shown it is the non-survival of juveniles over their first winter that is to blame.  Some birds seem to always get a bad press...Magpies.....Herring Gulls....Feral Pigeons....I prefer to turn this round and and look at the animal pointing the finger....humans!

This is the second Sparrowhawk in the net at the orchard.  This time a female.....