A morning at Brandon Marsh.

Not having been out for a few days because of the weather as soon as I saw on Monday morning that the sky was brightening up I set off for Brandon Marsh.However by the time I got there just after 10.00AM the skies had become very cloudy and just as I turned the engine off it began to rain.Damn and Blast!!!!!!

I very nearly headed back off home but when the rain stopped 20 minutes later I headed off down the muddy paths to the hides.I was wearing my designer wellies which I bought last year and which are nice and light,very warm and of course waterproof but have a major fault.There is little tread on the soles and have obviously been designed for posing and not walking down muddy paths because it's like walking on ice so I have to take ballet dancer steps when I negotiate the bad bits.

Not only were there no decent birds in any of the hides but there were no birders either.It wasn't till I'd been in the Carlton hide for half an hour that I saw my first birders.They soon got bored looking at nothing and started to talk about their recent birding trips which included the Gambia,Texas,Costa Rica and Alaska.I decided not to mention my recent birding trip to Draycote Water.

All I got shots of after an hour in the Carlton hide was of a distant Bullfinch and they were pretty poor.

I decided to give in then and headed back to the cafe for a cup of tea but luckily spotted a decent sized flock of Siskins and Redpolls. Unfortunately they were high in the trees so no decent pics but still nice to see.

The bad luck continued in the cafe when I found out that the attractive waitress was not on duty.However on the way home I did spot my first Fieldfare of the winter and managed a few shots out of the car window.