Babbs Mill Nature Reserve, Solihull.

Nice trip out to Solihull to visit Babbs Mill Nature Reserve which was largely frozen which was strange because Shard End Lake which is nearby was mostly unfrozen.

Highlight of the day was seeing a Water Rail which was foraging around amongst the waterside vegetation, I'd been told there were a couple at this site by a local so it was nice to actually spot on. Other than that it was the usual mixture of birds including plenty of Tit and Finches as well as many vocal Wren, there have been Shoveler and Goosander present on the lake recently but sadly there were none around today.

Birds seen today were, Blue Tit, Great Tit, Long Tailed Tit, Chaffinch, Goldfinch, Greenfinch, Bullfinch, House Sparrow, Dunnock, Wren, Robin, Great Spotted Woodpecker, Collared Dove, Blackbird, Carrion Crow, Magpie, Wqoodpigeon, Feral Pigeon, Grey Wagtail, Grey Heron, Mute Swan, Water Rail, Moorhen, Coot, Gadwall, Tufted Duck, Mallard, Domestic Goose (who are now sadly down to eight birds, if the council insist on killing the young again this year they'll never get their numbers back up) and Canada Goose. 

I also left many piles of bird seed, mealworms, sunflower hearts etc, on my travels today, which is something I always do anyway whatever the weather but obviosly any supplementary food for the birds in winter is literally a matter of life and death.

As you can see in the last picture I came across a nice bit of fly tipping to go with all the usual rubbish you find littered everywhere in this country, I'm not going to have a rant about the disgusting 'people' who insist on dropping litter but I will say if I could find out who left this fly tipping I would leave it on their doorstep or better still I would put it through their letterbox piece by piece and see how they like it !