Cassiobury Park (5th March)

I had a little free time today between 14:00-14:50pm and spent the time (as usual) in Cassiobury Park for a bit of a break.  Not much was at the eastern end of the park (near the Cha Cha Cha cafe) with the main birds of note including 25+ Redwing feeding in the leaf litter and 1 Ring-necked Parakeet.  A flock of 43+ Black-headed Gulls were on the football fields.  However, most of the activity was down along the Gade River where several Mallard were dotted along the river with 2 Mandarin (a pair) amongst them on the flooded meadows in the nature reserve.  I was also alerted to the harsh "squak" of a ♂ Pheasant coming from the cress beds (apparently an unusual occurrence in the Park) and a Kingfisher shot out of the woods infront of me before briefly alighting on a bulrush.  A ♀ Bullfinch feeding in the slough berry hedgerow in the same area was also a nice surprise.