Two trips and two dips.

On Wednesday morning I braved the bitter cold weather and went over to Atherstone to see the escapee Night Heron that had been reported as showing again the previous day.Got there at 10.00AM in bright sunshine but a search along the canal proved fruitless and when I met the birder who had seen it the previous day he told me it had flown off yesterday evening.Oh dear !!

I then drove over to Shustoke reservoir to see if I could find something to get shots of but I had no luck there either.Mind you I didn't give it much of a go because the wind had got up and it was bitterly cold.I'm sure the wind had got tiny razor blades in it because it was cutting me to shreds.

I then drove over to Marsh Lane where I found that there was a lot of ice on all the ponds and the open water had nothing of note on it except for a few Common Gulls.There were three Common Snipe on the marsh but that was all. Although it was just after lunch I gave in and headed home to thaw out.

On Thursday messages from friends told me that some Waxwings had shown well on and off all day on Wednesday on a berry tree in Cubbington so I went over there to try my luck.I don't need any more shots of these chaps as last year with so many of them about I was able to get loads of shots but because they are such magical birds I couldn't resist seeing some again.

I joined a few friends near the berry tree but after waiting nearly three hours in the bitter cold and not seeing one I gave up and headed home.All was not lost because the chat was amusing and kept us all warm and there were lots of Redwings and a few Fieldfares about and surprisingly this chap as well.