Give me snow any day! These rainy days are an absolute disaster for wildlife watching and photography. It's pretty hard to take any sort of photo but with a little bit of patience it can be done. So, even with pouring rain which has been with us all day we have had a constant stream of birds in and out of the garden. I was pleased to see a Cock Chaffinch, the first for weeks and weeks in the garden. The Latin name "coelebs" means bachelor and is probably a reference to the habit this species has of moving in single sex flocks in the winter time. All of my Chaffinches have been females until today. Perhaps spring is nearer than we think in spite of the wintery weather the birds are starting to look for mates. This could be the case because even though it is cold and wet the days are getting longer.

I do admire the colour of this species, one of our common birds so often over-looked and taken for granted. The photo above was taken from the "bathroom" hide ……….. my upstairs bathroom window if you didn't know. From there I have a close sight of a cotoneaster tree, and an overlook of the apple tree at the end of my plot and now my neighbours have taken to feeding and there is a degree of activity on their feeders from mainly House Sparrows and Chaffinches. Today the Blue Tits were visiting the feeders and one popped over to the fat ball hung in the cotoneaster to attract the Blackcaps. 

  

The light as explained was dire but I did manage a nearly decent photo of this little bird. Look how she is almost wet and has rain spots on her tail.