Wednesday 3 April 2019

Ring Ouzel

Paid a very quick visit to Norton Green this afternoon after work.
Bumped into Tony Hukin who had been on site for a while who seemed to think that up to three Ring Ouzels were present but very elusive and flighty.
We made our way to the north west corner, not far from the travellers camp. A movement caught his eye in a big thorn bush and he went to investigate. I heard a chakking call and found a male Ring Ouzel which suddenly flew out into a small Sallow and giving pretty good views. Another birder on the northern ridge came down to see it, but it soon flew east onto the ridge by the camp. Tony and I the located it feeding on the ground, but it suddenly flew off and returned to the original thorn bush and then disappeared.
Tony seemed to think that it wasn't as well marked as another male he had seen earlier as the breast crescent seemed to be a bit duller and off white. However, we couldn't find any others while I was there.
In recent years Ring Ouzels have been a bit thin on the ground here and this was my first for some time-all recent sightings have been over towards the Therfield and Coombe Road area. Interestingly we haven't had any Wheatear here yet, and very few were seen last year, so i wonder if Norton is losing it's appeal.

1 comment:

Larry said...

That is the first time I've heard of that species.I'm going to look it up now. Great header photo!