Tuesday, April 01, 2008

Comment up front.

I liked this comment from Nigel at Abbey Meadows Blog...it brings it all back! How many Northumberland birders can remember finding a Corn Buntings nest? I recall one at the roadside between Pegswood and Ashington, just about the point where the new bypass road meets the old road...

"Aye those were the days Stew! East Stobswood before the road widening and the bends taken out I just wish I had my original notes to look at.

I can remember sitting on a haystack counting the thousands, yes thousands of finches and buntings at Rochesters farm at harvest time. Up to three hundered Tree Sparrows were not uncommon with similar numbers of Linnets and Chaffinches. Corn Bunting flocks would hold at least eighty birds and there would often be over a hundred Yellowhammers.

These birds have gone with the primitive farming methods that Rochester used.Its goodbye to those and hello to Buzzards, Speckled Woods and Banded Demoiselles
."

2 comments:

Blyth Birder said...

Whats a Corn Bunting mister?

Stewart said...

Do-do, Great Auk, Passenger Pigeon and Eskimo Curlew...