Grip this one back!

House Sparrow is something of a mega at The Lodge. Personally, I have seen only one here in the last five years, so we needed to formulate a plan...The nearest colony is on Stratford Road which runs along the southern perimeter of the reserve, so I thought it would be possible to tick them from the south-western extremity of the reserve.


This lunchtime, I grabbed Bash and we executed the plan. Within a few minutes of our arrival, we both heard a distant bird. It also gave us a chance to explore a part of the reserve that is 'off-limits.' From our vantage point, we had great views of a stretch of water and a reedbed at Warren Villas NR, and it will probably be here that we'll get our Acro's - and possibly Cetti's - in the spring.

Walking back over the new heath, we both stopped in our tracks and before us was first one, then two of one of our key species - Raven.

Team BTO may struggle with that one...we hope!

And with my colleague Tony Payne unblocking Little Owl, our list moves on to 71.