Not a bad vis mig session considering

The Safari went to bed last night dreaming of all the goodies we hoped to see/hear going over this morning; species like Siskin, Crossbill, Bullfinch (well they go over Heysham to the north of us so where do they end up?), Lapland Bunting, Snow Bunting, Reed Bunting,Tree Sparrow, Jay, Fieldfare, Ring Ouzel and anything else a little out of the ordinary.

Plans were thwarted when Frank got us up this morning an opening the door we looked up and saw a lorra lorra stars; Venus was still blazing away and in the west Jupiter and it's three close moons clustered at '10 o'clock' and poor old Ganymede stood out in the cold on its own - clear skies...darn it!!!

The walk to the watch point gave us a more ticking Robins and Blackbirds clucking away than yesterday morning. At the watch point as a chill mist hung in the lowest parts of the fields we heard a Skylark and a Snipe in the darkness long before any hint of the sun appeared on the eastern horizon.

The sun started to come up and the birding was hard going, our fears about the clear skies were beginning to ring true and we took to photographing the sunrise. Venus is the bright dot top right and under the left hand pylon you can just make out the flat tops of the now Hen Harrier-less Bowland Fells; time for a huntin shootin fishin landed gentry minister in charge of our wildlife heritage to resign?...if only!

So did we get any of the species listed above? Not likely!
We did get - and apologies for the list rather than a dirty great blurb of prose -
Pied Wagtails - 10 in dribs n drabs
Skylark - 2, one in the dark and one near the end of the watch

Song Thrush - 10 again in dribs and drabs with one or two dropping in to the nearby hedges
Chaffinch - 10 (AGAIN!) in dribs n drabs all southish apart from 1 due east
Starling - plenty about but two singles went south ignoring the local flocks
Redwing - not many, a flock of 8 and 4 early on and a single towards the end of the watch

Mistle Thrush - one south landed on one of the pylon and then the building behind us but the two on the walk back to Base Camp were on the same aerial as yesterday so we now assume they are locals and not migrants at all

Magpie - one west very very high, like the Starlings ignoring the local birds
Blackbird - four south and plenty of others eating the berries on the Hawthorns
Woodpigeon - 114+ in five flocks the biggest of which was about 30
Jackdaw - odds n sods and a big flock of 60+

Greenfinch - only 6 and again the doubled back rather than cross the railway in to the urban area behind us

Meadow Pipit - 69 no flocks bigger than 15
Sparrowhawk - a local bird

Redpoll - 3 went north, could they have been missed going south and turned round like the Greenfinches?

Carrion Crow - a late entry on to the list after being ignored but by now it seemed that some were deffo on the move rather than all being local birds

Mute Swans - two locals dropped in to one of the many ponds

A Goldcrest was along the path through the trees.

Back at Base Camp as we rounded the corner in to our street a Coal Tit was in a neighbours tree, a migrant?

Distant flocks of Pink Footed Geese went by, mostly south today. This was the biggest flock - how many are there? We guestimated 125 at the time - were we close?

 And here's a close up of yesterday's golden tree - a Norway Maple

A good slap up feast at a country pub with the family gave us a Goldcrest in the hedge across the road and a Buzzard soaring over the field behind that. Motorway drive 30 miles Buzzards 0 - Kestrels 2...and again no Roe Deer in their 'favourite' field.

Where to next? Back to the seaside tomorrow should be nice and flat and cetaceanny.

In the meantime let us know if any of your 'hit-list' made it in to your outback today