Sheldon Country Park.

Early morning trip to Sheldon Country Park for a walk around the park, a walk to the runway of Birmingham International Airport, Marston Green Train Station and finally a visit to Sheldon Old Rectory Farm. The Country Park is covers an area of just over 300 acres, comprising open grassland, wetlands, old hedgerows and some mature woodland. Situated on the very edge of the city, the land has escaped development and has become a haven for wildlife while the Farm operates as a demonstration farm, showing city dwellers traditional methods of farming. animals kept at the farm include Jersey cattle, pigs, goats, ponies, ducks, chickens and geese.

Sight of the day had to be 150 - 200+ Woodpigeon and 100+ Carrion Crow leaving their roost, well worth arriving early for. There was also a sizable flock of Goldfinch in amongst some overgrown woodland scrub, I couldn't tell how many were there bit judging by the noise they were making I'd say there was around 40. The bushes that run adjacent to the train line held large numbers of Great Tit and smaller numbers of Blue Tit. I didn't see any waterfowl on the river at all which was strange and disappointing all I did actually see was three cormorant flying overhead. At the end of the runway path by an official viewing point there are a large amount of bushes and brambles that have always held a good amount of House Sparrow (maybe because it's close to houses) and I'm pleased to say they were still there making the usual amount of noise Sparrows do. At the farm there are always large numbers of noisy House Sparrow and they easily numbered in the couple of hundred today, which was great to see and hear.

Birds seen were Kestrel, Blue tit, Great Tit, Long Tailed Tit, Goldfinch, House Sparrow, Robin, Jay, Song Thrush, Redwing, Pied Wagtail, Blackbird, Collared Dove, Woodpigeon, Feral Pigeon, Carrion Crow, Magpie and Cormorant. I also heard plenty of Wren but didn't actually managed to see one.