A bash at Blashford lakes

I had a nice visit today at blashford-if a  bit short.
First from tern hide i saw large amounts of waterfowl-including pintail,goosander,goldeneye, and several thousand shoveler. I also had a Yellow-legged gull
next by Rockerford lake i saw a party of 4 goldeneye and 2 black-necked grebe which were distant the lake.
Next ivy lake which held a very close Bittern. Also were large numbers of wigeon,gadwall,tufted duck and shoveler. A great-creasted grebe was there also.

Variety of waterfowl inc-goosander(male and fem), shoveler, (male and fem) and pintail.

Wigeon

Male (left) and female (right) goldeneye

Black-necked grebe

BNG

Bittern

Beautiful bittern

Bittern

An avian poxed great tit

Next to the woodland hide where there was a nice selection of passerines including a lesser redpoll. Most intrestingly and perhaps most sadly was a great tit with avian pox. This is the first ever bird i have seen in hants which has avian pox. A sad end to a great day.

Hawfinches-remixed

I have been playing with the photos i took earlier and edited them. 

I have also edited some pictures i took of yellowhammers a few days ago. 

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What do you think of them-do you like the changes?
Comments appreciated.

Hawfinches......lots of them

Had a lovely morning trip to Mercer way Romsey today. By Mercer way there is a small un-birdy looking park. But this place is a  haven for hundreds of finches including a flock of about 25-30 Hawfinches. It was such a massive flock and they are so pretty. Their calls were everywhere. Among them were hundreds of greenfinches, chaffinches, tits and one female brambling!

I was also gripped off on the reported waxwings- very annoying.

White-winged fancy

Barn owl

Had a lovely adult iceland gull this morning, which was a new patch record and had eluded me on previous days. Also had  pretty barn owl hunting over the grassland.

Barn owl

Record shot of the iceland gull

Patch birding-2013 highlights

Water rail (sorry for repeated pic)

Doing the patch birding competion and have at the moment 80 species and only 82 points.

Siskin(surprisingly quite rare around here)

Intrestingly have had 2 records of goosander this feb. The very well showing water rail which was a patch record and a  pleasure to watch.

Little egret

Goosander taken 2/2/13

Fem goosander taken 3/12/12

 My two pointers i have seen-little egret-pretty common here with about 3 in patch at the moment, such striking birds!

Repeated barn owl pic

 The other two pointer is a cettis warbler-seen amazingly well(one of my favourite birds) it showed up to a meter singing amazing!

Female blackcap

Treecreeper

 Other highlights have been dunlin a nice bird for inland. A single golden plover has also shown. Other highlights-skylark,siskin and sparrowhawk. The best bird of 2013 in patch this year has to be the barn owl which showed very close for 2 seperate days-stunning (sorry posted about this before). My total of 80 species has made me extremely happy and hope to get more!