After Saturday dashing around the Suffolk countryside Sunday was a stay at home day. The lambs and March lambing ewes needed vaccinating which meant gathering in 3 groups of sheep all in different places. It was another cold wintery day with a biting easterly wind. I started with the lambs near to the house. As I finished weighing, worming and jabbing them I noticed a group of Moorhens in the chicken paddock looking anxious and spotted a stoat working its way along the hedge bordering the dyke. It stayed out in the open for the full 25m giving excellent views. Meanwhile a Great Spotted Woodpecker was drummimg in the alder wood in hopeful anticpation of spring. The Rooks, however, paid just a brief visit to their rookery and the large flock of Siskin and Redpoll was still zipping noisily about between alder clumps.
It was afternoon before I got out onto the marsh to round up the last group of sheep. There was a single Lapwing on one of our marshes. In the past week I had noticed other singles and pairs of Lapwings scattered across the marshes. Are these prospective breeders checking out territories? Maybe spring is on its way.
The Teal seem to have moved out of the wood on to the marsh to feed (presumably having exhausted the food in the woods?) and the drakes appeared to be playing close attention to the females. Other birds of note were a Green Woodpecker and just one Marsh Harrier
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