Two Barred

I was out with Mark on Sunday and we went off to Broomhead Reservoir near Sheffield first thing where up to seven Two Barred Crossbills have been associating with 100+ Common Crossbills and frequenting a small area with Larch Trees at the Western end. Now the trouble with the Bird Information Services is they often give a false impression of how things are and what we thought was going to be quite straight forward soon changed upon meeting birders who were there for the second or third time and others who had waited for five hours or more for a sighting. There had been no sightings before we arrived so we joined a group of birders stood just outside the main area offering a much wider view and eventually after several groups of Common Crossbills went over a juv Two Barred was picked out perched on top of one of the trees, fairly distant but we got good scope views then 10 mins later a couple of birders came out from the main area and told us a male, female and two juvs were showing well in there, we headed in but unfortunately the flock took flight as we got there although one was making its very distinctive “trumpet” call as they flew off, we hung around for a couple more hours hoping they would return but they didn’t and as boredom set in we decided to cut our losses and have a change of scenery. We headed off to Old Moor Wetlands where we had a fairly steady afternoons birding with the bulk of sightings from the Wath Ings Hide, including several species of Wader, lots of juv Grey Herons, a couple of Little Egrets plus the Spoonbill and also a nice posing Kingfisher right outside the hide but although the Night Heron had given itself up the day before it had gone back into its usual routine of hiding away during the day.

Eclipse Ducks

changing light

it caught several fish

give it a bash

then down the hatch