Playing Catch Up! - Kinver Edge, Stourport

We are way behind on posting at the moment, so this one is a summary of a few small walks and a bit of Garden stuff.

So I'll start off with a walk at Kinver Edge. It was lovely sunny Sunday afternoon. we parked near the National Trust Rock Houses and walked up past them and up on to the 'Edge', we found ourselves a nice viewpoint, whipped out the flasks and had a coffee, nothing much to report other than Crows and Woodpigeons at this stage. After coffee we carried on along the edge and into the woods, where we stumbled upon a couple of Goldcrest. Typically with Goldcrest they don't stay still so getting a photo was difficult but I managed a couple for the record:

Further on we came across some more Goldcrest this time flitting way up in the trees, there must have been 4 or 5, but as they were darting about so much it was difficult to tell, a Wren showed briefly but that was about it in the woods, when we emerged back on the heath, a couple of Buzzards showed wee, whilst we watched some Long-tailed Tits:

So on the birding front that was pretty much it.

A few days later on another glorious day, we headed off towards Stourport to do the Stourport Circular Walk. We parked up at Blackstone (near the Safari Park) and joined the route there heading into Stourport along the River Severn, we immediately spotted a Goosander on the river, so a good start, sadly though after that there weren't many birds around at all, some Blue Tits in the trees a Buzzard, but the next highlight was a Jay, before we arrived after 3 miles (ish) in Stourport and a late lunch at Weatherspoons!

From Stourport we continued  the walk, but along the Canal for a fair while, we saw some Long-tailed Tits nest building. From here on in though the birds abandoned us! The walk continued through Wyre Forest Golf Course after which the route markers disappeared, and the downloaded map didn't seem to quite correspond to the terrain! We eventually met up with a nice family walking their dogs in Burlish Top NR, who put us back on track, dropping down by the Devil's Spittleful NR and back to the car some 7.66 Miles in all according to the GPS, although the published walk is supposed to be 6.5!

Next a couple of shots from the Garden, Spring is in the air (for Frogs!):

And a first for our Garden a Lesser Redpoll:

and a Magpie nest building in our conifers: