... a little later as the sun rose a Cuckoo sang ...
But these were not the target birds. Black Grouse numbers last year were disappointingly low - somewhere in the 20s of displaying males resulting from poor breeding productivity the previous year. This week we had 45 displaying males - a great result !
A walk around Miltonrigg Wood in search of migrants ... high in the leafless canopy a male Pied Flycatcher dashed frenetically from perch to perch ... then uttered just a few characteristic notes ...
... turning south down the track and more of those jaunty notes and phrases ... all delivered from just a couple of song posts ...
... further on another lovely male Pied Flycatcher was singing away from its perch ... so good to experience among the bare leafless twigs ...
... when I listened to the recording at home I noticed a feature I had not been aware of before ... each song was prefixed by a brief 'buzzy' note ... this shows as the very up and down trace at the start of the sonogram ...
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... then three pairs of high and low notes followed by some complex warbling motifs ...
A quiet session in the upland part of Geltsdale while continuing the search for Hen Harriers saw more life on the walk out ... a short burst of four typewriter-like notes stopped me in my tracks ... some short grassy patches was the place to look ... a male Ring Ouzel nervously feeding among a few stones ...
... then slipped away silently ...
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