A lovely sunny day so time for a jaunt around The Brecks. A quick call in to Lynford Arboretum produced very little apart from a small flock of Siskins in the Alders by the lake. It was a bit tricky getting them in the sun and without too many branches across them but I did manage a few.
Now on to Santon Downham to look for the large flock of Bramblings that had been reported. A walk along the river revealed a pair of Marsh Tits, which seem to be the commonest tit up here.
Eventually we did locate the flock of finches in the north-west corner of the car park. There were about 400 in the flock of which probably half were Bramblings. The main problem now was how to get close to them without disturbing them, and the obvious answer was to use my car, the metal hide. I opened the windows and manoeuvred the car to within 15 yards from where the birds were feeding and waited.
Not surprisingly, the first bird to appear was the friendly Robin which gave us a chance to try out the set-up and check the settings.
And then the Bramblings returned to carry on their feast. I think by now the seeds in the leaf litter were exhausted because they were spending most of their time seaching amongst the grass next to the leaf litter. Some of the males were fairly advanced in their transition to breeding plumage.
However, I much prefer to photograph Bramblings in a tree, a very pleasing setting.
Wow, what a fantastic couple of hours. You never know what you are going to get at Santon Downham, but you are rarely disappointed.
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