Crane at Hanney 27th Dec

I received a call from a game keeper who gave a pretty good description of a bird feeding in his maize game strip; reddish face, dark tail, and buffy all over. It could have been a Goldfinch until he mentioned it was four feet tall! He thought it might be a Common Crane but it didn't have a black head like the one in his book. I took a look and sure enough found a 1st winter Crane in the second field on the left 200 m after you leave West Hanney on the road to Denchworth. He first saw it on 24th Dec. It's fairly distant as the maize strip is at the far side of the field.

Cheers,

Ian