Happy New Year!

 So here we are, the New Year is almost upon us and, for many birders, that also means a new notepad and a new Year List - when spotting blackbirds and robins becomes exciting all over again!

This is certainly the case for the Warwick 100 - a small group of enthusiasts who set an annual target of noting 100 species of birds within a two mile radius of St Mary's Church over a twelve month period.

Last year, we smashed it with 116 different species - a brilliant and memorable year with a visiting hoopoe the star of the show.

But the slate is now wiped clean, we are back to zero again and a new list can begin!  It is likely to be much more of a test this year, as our most prolific bird-finder will only be able to contribute on rare occasions, but we are ready to take on the Warwick 100 challenge once more.

Join us as we log and blog our way through 2022 and...bring on the birds!

End of Year roundup for 2021

This year has been another good year for our little area of Warwick and its 2 mile radius.  As a small group we managed to find 116 different species of birds in total making this our best ever year.   This is another great achievement considering 90% of the species found involved no car travel and the other 10% involved car journeys of less than 3 miles.  

We started the year off well with at least 8 Stonechats over-wintering at 4 different locations within the Warwick area, 1 Woodcock, 1 Brambling, 1 Jack Snipe, 1 Merlin, our returning Whooper Swan and a Russian White Fronted Goose that only stayed for 24 hours.  We also had a record number of 5 Green Sandpipers at one location and our highest count of Common Snipe was a maximum of 25 birds.

Spring was quiet this year with just 2 Wheatear and 1 Common Redstart being the highlights.  Summer was also quiet but the Racecourse area had its best season of breeding Skylarks for several years with a small increase in breeding pairs.  Autumn, after achieving just 1 Whinchat was saved by our star bird of the year, a Hoopoe at IBM.

Hoopoe by Alec Cuthbertson

Winter is always our best season for recording species and this winter has had a promising start with at least 2 Stonechats overwintering as well as a Cetti's Warbler but no sign so far of our Whooper Swan yet.

We reached our target of 100 birds within the first 100 days of 2021 which is the first time we have managed to do that, with the 100th bird being a Yellow Wagtail found by Lizzy.  

The full list of species seen during the year can be found here.