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Billinge Hill and surrounding area

I went for a look for the stonechat that Andrew found this morning. I got there for about 10.30am and had a really good look around the summit. After about an hour and a half searching I finally gave up and headed across to Promised Land Farm. When I got back to the car I was gutted after having blanked again - I'm still gutted about missing the kittiwake recently!

The sun was coming out so I thought I'd have 'one last look' for the stonechat. Eventually I saw a distant bird perched up on a bit of scrub that looked a likely candidate. As I got closer it was joined by another bird and I could see that they were both stonechat. I didn't have much time left at this point so had a quick go at getting photos - I'll put them up later but they're not very good. I feel slightly better about the kittiwake now!...

Stonechat 2 (1m,1f)
Grey Partridge 2
Bullfinch 1m
Goldcrest 1
Tree Sparrow 20+
Also skylark, yellowhammer and linnet in small numbers.

 





If anyone is going to have a look for the stonechat, they were exactly where Andrew said, between the summit and the midden pile. They're to the left of the path that runs NNW in the middle of this map between the fields...

http://binged.it/1fEJqK7

Damian P
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2 comments :

  1. Andrew4 March 2014 at 18:24

    When I e mailed Colin yesterday I mentioned that I thought there may be two. I wasn't positive because it was quite foggy initially. The individual I stalked for a few minutes suddenly flew towards the beacon and then a few seconds later there was a stonechat at the midden pile again. So I thought that there may be more than the one! How likely is it that they could stay and breed?

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  2. Email4 March 2014 at 21:25

    Hi Andrew, you probably did see both of them - they were sticking together all that time that I saw them. I was wondering the same about them staying and breeding, that would be amazing. I reckon if they do it'll be on the other side of the fence in the quieter bit.

    Damian

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