Holmebrook Valley Park 14/01/18

I went down to the lake at Holmebrook Valley for about 45 minutes yesterday. There were certainly a few more gulls that the day before with about 70 to 80 Black Headed Gulls on the water. I had a quick scan through the flock and found a Common Gull, 1 adult Lesser Black Backed Gull and 2 young gulls. I am not very good at identifying young gulls but I presume that they were either Lesser Black Backed or Herring Gull. I would prefer Herring Gull as they are not very common on the lake. As luck would have it, an adult Herring Gull landed on the lake at 12:15. That means I got 4 species of gull in one day which is good for Holmebrook Valley.

Here's one of the young gulls which is either Herring or Lesser Black Backed. Any suggestions are welcomed.

Apart from the gulls there was now a new Canada Goose on the lake. The bird was very shy and wouldn't come to seed like the local swans. There were also two male and a female Tufted Ducks today instead of just a female. The Greylag Goose and the Mute Swans were still there as normal and one of the Kingfishers was back on the lake after not being seen for a few days, although it was not being very photogenic and was flying away regularly.

                                            All three Tufted Ducks and the Canada Goose.

On my last post I mentioned that there seemed to be a lot of Bullfinches about and today there was even more and I managed to count at least 20 in two flocks.

One last photo for today. This is one of the cygnets from last years brood that survived, looking all grown up with adult feathers come through on its wings.