18/02/2021 Lea Marston & Coton Lakes, Warwickshire

Bufflehead: After spending the morning carrying out an preliminary ecological appraisal in Solihull I decided to spend my limited exercise time at Lea Marston lakes., where a visitor from America has been spotted. 

The bufflehead is a widespread breeding bird in Canada and there are a few small colonies in north-west USA.

Its name is derived from ancient Greek boukephalos, "bullheaded", from bous, "bull " and kephale, "head", a reference to the oddly bulbous head shape of the species.

It took me a long while to find this bird and with some collective help from another birder on site and good mate Adam Archer (via a swift phone call) I soon found the birds location. 

The bird was on B2 lake this lake is situated further north than the lake that the hide looks over. its attached to this lake by a small inlet and best viewed along the public right of way that runs adjacent to the railway line. When I saw the bird is was at some distance and the bird was constantly feeding, hence these really poor images. Still, it's a bufflehead, it's a new tick and it was stopped safely.