I was back at the reservoir on the 6th of March but didn't see any Crossbills, there are times I walk up here and see almost nothing, time of day, weather conditions, so many thinks have an effect on what we see.
March 7th 2023
So on March 7th I was up for my morning walk again, as I said above, what I see and when is affected by the weather, as is whether I come up at all.
Young Crossbill
I got my first sighting of a young bird on this walk, they're grey, depending on age, their colour starts to come through so you can often see them with some yellow or rust red, depending whether they are male or female.
You can see that this is a young female bird above.
The shot above was cropped in to give us a better view of this young bird which did't hang about too long, these were the only usable shots I got before she was gone.
You may have noticed by now that these are all female birds, I was yet to see a male and it was becoming a bit of an obsession :)
Crossbill female against the water
I did see another bird on my walk, right down at the shore side on the tip of a pine, as usual.
I did come across a female not too far from the path but almost hidden in the tree branches.
I've found that these birds can be right next to you and you might not notice them. They sit quietly munching away on pine cones or similar and are mostly quiet. A good sign they are around is when bits of cone are drifting down from above but, Siskins and other birds also eat in the same tree, as we've seen.
Crossbills do sing or call so once you get your ear in to that you can tell if they are around.
Young Crossbill
There's a wee doo'cote in the trees, leading off the main path and I often sneak up there to see if there's anything around and this time, I got lucky.
Looked like a family of birds, no male again, feeding on the young cones but I got this one shot of a youngster and they were off.
