As the sun sets over the Carr

By 4.20 p.m. yesterday i was left standing alone at Prestwick Carr. The last photographer decided to leave because "the light had gone"

depends on what you want to capture, i suppose.

It was getting bitterly cold very quickly and a number of Blue and Great Tits, Robins and Dunnocks were frantically tucking into some bird feed that had been left on one of the posts in the area of the Owls roosts.
 It was hard to tell, but earlier at least 6-8 Shorties were on show over a large area on both sides of the Bumpy Road with lots of interaction taking place. Not much else around in the hedgerows at that time apart from a single male Bullfinch belting out a little tune atop of some large trees by the side of the road.
As i slowly made my way back to the car at Mayfair Cottage a Pheasant burst up close by making a change of undies essential and i noticed 8 flights of Starlings passing through heading to roost over a period of twenty minutes. All of the flocks, which varied between 30 and 400, appeared over the woods in the danger zone and traveled south east ish towards Dinnington. Approximately 800 birds in total.

On Tuesday i popped down to North Shields Fish Quay mid afternoon and although no Icelands were reported on that day i did have one on the shed roof briefly.

FURTHER INFORMATION.
A posting on Northumberland and Tyneside Bird Club by RWM tells of a Starling roost on the overhead cables beside the A1 at Brunswick. When he passed at 4.50p.m. on 8th Feb. it was performing very nicely.
Ties in well with my Starling sighting.
Having witnessed the murmuration at Gretna recently and seeing the birds there as they came in to join the others i could tell these birds were focused in the same way. It was as if they were on a mission something i also said to Howden Blogger at Gretna.