Hesketh Out Marsh RSPB this morning.

Tree Sparrow at Hesketh Out Marsh, 21 April 2012.

 Cold and breezy again this morning on the Ribble, the WNW wind not helping migrants one little bit. A Barn Owl hunting the ditches near Dib Lodge was a nice start but it wasn't until I'd almost completed the circuit at Hesketh Out Marsh before I saw my first real good birds in the form of a pair of Yellowhammers. The male was calling from a hedgerow (that have unfortunately been cropped by the local farmer, rather than "laid" like the RSPB reserve ones), being joined by the female before flying a few fields to the south. Rare birds at HOM, not seen a spring one for a couple of years now.

 There were also 21 White Wagtails in the fields with a few Pieds and at least 30 Meadow Pipits. Four pairs of Grey Partridges, a pair each of Tufted Duck and Gadwall, tight flock of 80 Golden Plovers heading south west, Stock Doves and Corn Bunting here and there and 22 Avocets on the lagoons.