Snow

Well after a week of plummeting temperatures and overnight frosts apparently down to -8 we finally got some snow. It started yesterday evening and continued through the night and I woke to see the garden covered in about six inches of the stuff. Trivial compared to much of Europe, but we were still told to only make a journey if absolutely necessary due to the 'treacherous' conditions.
 The one good thing is that it had warmed up slightly and it was easy to clear the path and the dustbin lid which passes for a bird bath (most of last week it had frozen solid, requiring two kettles to melt).
 With no pans to go out birding this weekend on the grounds that I would rather stay cozy, I set myself up for two days of garden birding, though as it turned out not much actually happened.
 Heard a Dunnock singing while topping up the feeders-for some reason my 'resident' birds vanished in the summer and never came back, so it was nice to hear one in the area. A couple of Greenfinches flew over-another lost species for the garden. My pair of Robins were soon down, followed by a couple of Blackbirds, the Wood Pigeons and Collared Doves and eventually the large flock of House Sparrows finally paid a visit. Two Goldfinches in the birch were the first in the garden this year-they have been heard singing in the big trees outside.
 The one species I had hoped to visit were Redpolls, in recent weeks I have heard a few from time to time.
 Scanning the skies produced the usual assortment of Pigeons, Starlings, Crows and Gulls. There were no signs of any thrush or wader moments, in fact absolutely nothing out of the ordinary.