We popped in for a day last year when we were on hols in the Peak District. So impressed by the place, decided to take a full week as close as poss. Ended up at Carsington Village in a couple of cottages at Swiers Farm (highly recommended - google for Carsington Cottages).
On arrival the first thing we heard were swallows, dozens of them, with at least 4 nests in the barn at the front of the farm. Didn't actually see any young, but the adults were in and out all day - maybe there were other nests out of sight. A big ash tree opposite was always full of chaffinches, greenfinches and goldfinches. A beautiful cacophony on waking in the morning!
Residents in the back garden include the loudest (one legged) blackbird I have ever heard, several wrens, loads of jackdaws and a loud song thrush just over the hedge. Flybys of black headed gulls, magpies and carrion crows, the odd buzzard, a greater spotted woodpecker & a kestrel. No owls though ! I missed my own garden birds - tits, dunnocks & robins - none here ! Driving to and from the reservoir, loads of wrens everywhere, plus chaffinches and more blackbirds.
Day trips to the res. got me seeing the usual suspects :
Canada geese by the bucketload, 5 cackling geese, lots of lapwings with 2 separate broods of chicks, redshanks, one pair with 6 chicks, tufted ducks, mute swans, mallards, two pairs of gadwall, several pairs of gt crested grebe, one pair with 2 chicks riding pillion, barnacle geese, greylag geese, coots with chicks, moorhens, black headed gulls, oystercatchers, and curlews. Several house martin nests visible on the main reception building with lots of them in the air (only confirmed later when I reviewed my photos!)
Slightly more exciting spots were :
A distant kestrel, a heron, a rather strange "hybrid leucistic red crested pochard" (which was confirmed by Roger Carrington, the county recorder, nice bloke), an escapee bar headed goose, one little ringed plover and one ringed plover, one little grebe.
Away from the water, reed buntings (apparently they have ten breeding pairs there), bullfinch, goldfinch, chaffinch, tree and house sparrows all at the feeder. In the trees on the way to & from the car - wrens, more chaffinches, garden warbler (heard first then glimpsed to confirm not a blackcap).
Heard only :-
A hobby, grasshopper warbler (at Sheepwash Car Park, Tues 6 June), chiffchaffs.
I must say, that all of the members of the local club I met were most accommodating of a BBB (see avatar), and I was made to feel very welcome there, esp on Saturday when they had an open day with lots of scopes out, and everyone letting folk know what was where
Thanks Carsington Bird Club !Now it's Portugal in two weeks, Carsington again maybe in September for a short break, then another week next year for sure !