Hilly Fields Dawn Chorus walk

Over a dozen insomniacs joined Chris McGaw of Rivers and People Project for this dawn chorus stroll around the park, and we were well rewarded.

Some of the 5am insomniacs

Full moon over the Nature Reserve

As we made our way towards the Nature Reserve we had a glorious full moon in front of us and the rising sun behind.

Sun rising over Lewisham

We heard Wren, Blackbird, Woodpigeon and Ring-necked Parakeet in the Nature Reserve but the most notable was the Blackcap.


Later, on the road past the school we stopped to admire the Long-tailed Tits, Goldfinches, a Chaffinch and also heard a Dunnock.

Chaffinch beside the school

On the west side of the North Fields there was a flock of 10 Magpies then, beside the cricket pitch with some Woodpigeon were a pair of Stock Doves and, on the hillside behind them, three Mistle Thrush.

We are all very grateful to Chris for this morning's wonderful walk and look forwards to another next year.  Let's hope the proposed cafe will be open in time for a welcome cuppa then!

We saw or heard 20 species this morning, for a complete list click below:

Getting ready for the Dawn Chorus

I had a quick recce around the park between 04:45 and 05:15 this morning in preparation for Thursday's walk.  Didn't see a lot because it was quite a dull and overcast morning, but what a chorus!

Hilly Fields at 5am

What I did see this morning were Blackbird, Starling, Carrion Crow, Magpie, Robin and Mistle Thrush.  I heard lots but was particularly pleased to recognise a Blackcap, because I only learnt its banging-two-stones-together call on last Tuesday's dawn chorus walk with Chris along Waterlink Way.

See the Bird Track stats for Hilly Fields

You can peruse the stats that Bird Track has for Hilly Fields after first registering here then log-on to BirdTrack and click Species by Grid at the bottom of the Data Home page.

This will take you to the Species by Location page where you must first Choose your area using one of the four options provided. 

The fastest, if you can remember the code, is Option 4) where you enter TQ 3775, otherwise use Option 2) choosing England then London Nat Hist Soc then Hilly Fields Park.  Then click Next.

Under Choose buffer size click Option 1) no buffer.

Finally in Choose your time period and sort criteria select whatever you need (I usually leave the defaults) and click Go.

The area covered by the stats is a 1km square with the entire park in the bottom left and Lewisham Station at top right, but the majority of the stats are ours (except, among others, the Pheasant!).  If you then click on a species name, further stats are revealed, such as that Pheasant on 8 Feb 11 in Revelon Road and these graphs of House Sparrow sightings.

Example of stats from BirdTrack

Please try it.

A Cuckoo!

I've just been reminded that on my way home from the dawn chorus walk I heard a Cuckoo in Hilly Fields Park!

Waterlink Way dawn chorus walk

Four of us met Chris McGaw at 5am today for a dawn chorus walk. 

Small group joined Chris (using bins) at 5am

We were not disappointed, the final list being:

Blackbird

Blackcap (*)

Blue Tit

Carrion Crow

Chaffinch

Chiffchaff (*)

Collared Dove

Dunnock (*) Feral Pigeon

Goldfinch

Great Spotted Woodpecker

Great Tit (*)

Green Woodpecker (*)

Greenfinch

Herring Gull

House Sparrow (*)

Jay

Lesser Whitethroat (*)

Long-tailed Tit

Magpie

Mallard

Mistle Thrush

Moorhen

Ring-necked Parakeet

Robin (*)

Song Thrush (*) Starling

Swift

Whitethroat

Woodpigeon

Wren

*: Heard but not seen by me.
I do hope you'll join us on our own Dawn Chorus Walk in Hilly Fields on the 19th

Big Garden Birdwatch results

The RSPB has recently published their full results which can be found here .  The top 20 species for Greater London closely matched our own but included Collard Dove, Chaffinch, Dunnock and Coal Tit which were not seen in Hilly Fields that day.  However, we did enjoy many Redwing, Black-headed Gull, Mistle Thrush, Wren and Great Spotted Woodpecker that didn't feature on the RSPB's Greater London results.

Waterlink Way winter dawn chorus walk

Four of us met Chris McGaw at Sainsbury's, Bell Green, today for a winter dawn chorus walk of Waterlink Way. We started at 6:30am feeling surprisingly warmer than we did at 5am last May. On the other hand it was misty and not yet light enough for the binoculars.

Some of the Fieldfare

There were two highlights of the day, the first was the flock of Fieldfare in a tree beside the River Pool approx. 150m north of the Winsford Road/Broadmead footbridge, the second was a pair of Kingfisher in a shrub on the west bank of the river approx. 150m further north.

 

I managed to snatch a couple of photos, but they're poor quality because they were taken with my compact camera with the lens at full zoom, plus digital zoom, plus another order of magnitude enhancement with Photoshop.

Pair of Kingfisher

I took a better photo of a Kingfisher from the Winsford Road/Broadmead footbridge on 24th January.  That photo can be seen here  
We reached the new bridge into Lewisham Hospital around 8:30 by which time the temperature seemed to have dropped a good 5degC, so we stopped there for a very welcome hot drink.