Updated

Apologies for the lack of posting, but due to illness there's been a lack of birding to post about. I'm still not right, but I figured I'd get something out.

Harkening back to Saturday; when I was only coughing periodically, and thought a nice stroll in the sunshine would be beneficial. As the folks wanted to go to Aylesbeare, due to not having been there for ages, I thought this sounded good. A Certain Shrike may have been a factor, too. With a Certain Little Black Dog along, it was footpaths only [[We're one of the very few who pay attention to 'No dogs, especially not running around off the lead' signs..]] but handily the Great Grey had been hanging around the bit ringed by footpaths, so I had a teeny bit of hope. It was nice and sunny, though not super bird-y, with a few Tits and Goldcrests in the trees being pretty much it. When we got to the House With The Fancy Conifers and I said that the Shrike had been seen on the trees to the right, within 30 seconds it flew in from ahead and landed on a Holly to our right. I love it when a bird's read the script! :D

It sat there for a couple of minutes, wagging it's tail in the breeze and looking cute with the light behind it [Shrikes are cute, at least from a distance. Not so much if you're a lizard and they're up close and personal, though...]. As we moved on around the perimeter we saw the Shrike again, this time with the light behind us and it sitting much closer on an electricity wire. Very nice. A most obliging bird, this one. The whole time we were there it had a small party of followers traipsing around the common after it - members changed fairly frequently, with fewer huge cameras than you'd expect but always 4 or 5 of them. We kept eyes open for conveniently passing Hen Harriers, but no joy. Nor did we see a single Dartford. I will be going back [sans LBD] later in the spring for a proper look - I'm hoping there are still some to find...

In the Garden, the arrival of the female Blackcap ignited a short but very sharp 3-way war as the truce between the two males ended - one of the males now holds the garden against anything he can. [The other is still in the area, but no further sign of the female once the dust settled]. Yesterday he was very mean to a poor innocent male Great Tit, chasing it with no mercy from all of the feeders [currently these are a fat cylinder in a bush, the fat block in the top of another bush, a roofed tray of mealworms and cheese and a pole with 3 feeders - fat balls, sunflower seeds and sunflower hearts] which was very antisocial of him. This psychotic little bird has even seen off a Blackbird, and only weight of numbers keeps the Sparrows, Chaffinches and Greenfinches safe. Speaking of, it's interesting to see that there's still a good 14 Chaffinches coming to the seed on the shed roof [and now into the Garden too] - I'd been expecting them to move back away now that it's warmed up. Evidently a good food source is worth more than what they'd get out in the countryside, even with all the cats...

Finally, for the first time in a week I dragged myself down to the harbour and saw... 30 Herrings, a Geeb, a Moorhen and 2 Shags. Wa-hey.