Grey Wagtail

[FredPuli43]

How common are grey wagtails? I'm in South Cambridgeshire and saw a female one yesterday. It was near a couple of pied ones, but the yellow under the tail made it noticeable. The RSPB site seems to suggest that it's not seen in lowland and away from fast rivers, but this area is flat and, though there is a river about 400 metres from here, it is sluggish.

Not the first time I've seen a bird where I didn't expect it. There was a meadow pipit in my kitchen this year, an egret by the flooded river ,and buzzards for the first time. But I haven't seen a corncrake here in 50 years, so it's not all a win.

[hammerman]

Get one or two who visit the garden i look after. They seem to come and go and are only ever seen around the pond.

Lovely birds.

[wildwood]

Can't help you as I've never been in your neck of the woods. But in Autumn/winter birds are often seen in places other than where they usually frequent. Following a successful breeding season there are birds surplus to the suitable habitat that are forced to look for new places to live. Unless they can adept they either die for lack of suitable food or fail to breed the folling season so expire that way.

It is Nature's way to produce more than is needed to ensure species stand a fighting chance.

[seadogg]

Infuriating creatures hammerman. Never about when you have the scope and binocs but all sort turn up when you are out. walking. That's why I rarely go out without a pair of Leica pocket glasses.

[rowanwitch]

locally common we have lots in the midlands anywhere with lots of streams and pools is likely to get them their numbers seem to increase in the winter I had them nesting outside my second floor office in the spring though as they found a spot where leaky pipes made a huge puddle on the roof and air currents blew in lots of insects

[FredPuli43]

Thanks, all. Dead right about unusual birds appearing just at the moment when you haven't got bins. I keep a pair in the car and one by this chair, but the little devils are usually gone by the time I pick the bins up.
This one , very obligingly, was on the drive in front of the car and flew a few yards ahead as I drove behind it'

Grey wagtails are unusual in this village, it seems. it may be that this one had come from farther afield, as Wildwood suggests, following the nearby river.

[Grandma_Yiddo]

I used to see one in Hinchingbrooke Hospital car park occasionally when I worked there.