Throughout the week I had been keeping my eye on the East Lancashire Ornithology Website.There had been several sightings of these beautiful birds in and around Burnley and one sighting in Blackburn. I had a chance of catching up with these colourful creatures on Friday 8th of February 2013. Allen Holmes had kept us all up to date on the numbers and places where they been seen. On Thursday 7th a worrying posting on the website read something like this , " 11 waxwings only... one tree has berries but they are dwindling fast "! This was a huge drop in numbers from 50 or so the previous day.
Arriving at Viking Place in Burnley where the birds had been seen I sat in the car scanning the nearby trees. After a few minutes high in a tree close by several Waxwings appeared. The outline of their dumpy shape and visible crests made the identification easy.
The birds stayed high in the tree for several minutes until being joined by more Waxwings, 29 in total now !
Below was a solitary type of Rowan tree that had berries It was being guarded jealously by a single Mistle thrush.The Mistle thrush was quite aggresive and was not going to give up its food supply easily, it chased and harassed every Waxwing that came close.The Waxwings knew that the Mistle thrush could not chase 29 different birds at the same time so as the thrush chased one away the others descended and a feeding frenzy ensued, but only until the Mistle thrush returned.
Watching the Mistle thrush chase away a Waxwing gave us the green light to prepare for the arrival of the main group of Waxwings upon the Rowan. Trying to focus on one bird amidst a hectic feeding frenzy was far from easy, but i am quite pleased with the results from that day !
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