Day 7 - 30 Days Wild - Bird watching with the family

Today was my sister's birthday so I thought it would be nice if we all did something wild for day 7. My boyfriend Dan and myself decided to take my mum and sister to the Gnoll Country Park to introduce them to a bit of bird watching. The Gnoll Country Park is literally 3 miles from where I live and I am ashamed to say I have not been for many years. 

Before I go on my sister has an illness called Rheumatoid Arthritis, which means she can't walk far unaided and needs to rest frequently. With this in mind the Gnoll seemed the perfect place to go to enjoy some fresh air and spot some wildlife.

The parking was great and only costs £2 and the paths are flat and well laid. The first thing you see when entering the park is the massive fish pond which had many birds on it already. We got ourselves a lovely bench overlooking the pond and started to identify what we could see.

The pond at the Gnoll Country Park

My boyfriend Dan, sis and mum enjoying the view of the pond

It was amazing how many different birds we could see - we also bought a bag of bird seed from the visitor centre (only 30p!) to entice the birds near to us. 

This is what we saw...

A mallard family with 7 chicks

The cute 7 mallard chicks

A pair of swans and their 4 cygnets (the male was chasing the other ducks around the pond)

We were unsure what these ducks are, but since coming home we have worked out they are called mallard hybrid, it's more than likely the parents were mallard and a white duck - they are also called 'Manky Ducks' :(

A coot

An angry looking herring gull

A pair of tufted ducks

The pond wasn't the only place we saw wildlife, there was plenty flying overhead too - including a buzzard, we were all fighting over my pair of binoculars to see this one! It was great looking through my bird book to see what it actually looked like up close.

The buzzard up high

Identifying it in the book

We must have sat there for almost a hour when me and Dan decided to walk around the rest of the pond to see what else we could spot...

Lots of mature trees and meadows to explore.

An array of wild flowers filled the park

A carrion crow on the march!

A beautiful view of the pond

A weird tree that looks like the face of a cow...what do you think?

The cascades...

...and there were palmate newts in there!

A very scruffy fledgling robin

Beautiful views all around the pond

Collared Dove

A male chaffinch with juvenile.

Well we all had a fantastic time there, so much to see and the weather was beautiful. I think my mum and sis really enjoyed trying to identify the birds, although they knew most of them already.

I will defiantly come back to the Gnoll to explore more of it and if my sister comes again she can even hire a scooter that can deal with any terrain!

So a great day 7 and my random act of wildness was to introduce my mum and sis to nature, they loved it and I loved sharing it with them x