Last guiding of the year gives a pre-xmas Hawkie high!

My last guiding of the year was with Pau and Olga from Catalonia today. On the shortest day (or was that yesterday?) of the year daylight was a precious commodity but we had sun in the morning which at least meant we could bird soon after 9am.

First bird on the wish list was Hawk Owl and would he be sat in exactly the same tree as last week? Yes he would. A good start indeed J Also here we had Lesser Redpolls, Crossbills, Bullfinches, Yellowhammers and GS Wood.

Next sought after species was Waxwing and an emergency stop had us enjoying a roadside flock which showed very well. We also had a roadside GG Shrike but our next hoped for species was no so cooperative. I just couldn't find a Little Auk (despite having seen one yesterday) but we did have Guillemot, Razorbill, Kittiwake and Velvet Scoter at the three spots we tried.

With rain coming it got dark just after 2pm (days are short now!) which just gave us time to try for the fourth wished for species: Bearded Tits. They were calling from the reedbed at Fornebu and with multiple birds calling from two different spots I could be sure there are still at least three birds present but did they show? No!!

A very enjoyable day was had though and a day with Hawkie can never really go wrong can it?

happy campers scoring Hawkie

Waxwings in the 'scope