Home thoughts

Spadgling

The blackbird and the robin started singing simultaneously at ten to four, as if on some prearranged cue. Why any of us were awake at that time of the morning is a question for the ages.

I've been noticed

The spadgers and the blue tits are doing a good job of demolishing the suet blocks, and a better job of making the squirrels feel unwelcome at the feeder. They're a lot more careful about the magpies, and not without reason.

It occurred to me that I'm taking it on trust there's a resident blackcap, I've not actually seen it since the beginning of May. For all I know it may be a dunnock with a tape recorder.

Over the road a substantial tonnage of woodpigeons has been grazing the turf. The peak count for the week has been eighty-four birds, it's not often less than fifty birds if the kids aren't using the field.

Stretford Meadows

Whitethroat

There have been times this week when the back garden has resembled a crèche. The blue tits, great tits and spadgers park the youngsters in the rowan tree and Pyracantha bush to fend for themselves for a bit, either catching their own insects or dropping down to the feeder and having a go at the suet blocks. After half an hour or so the parents check in, there's a bit of fussing about and the family moves on as a unit to reappear later when the parents want a rest. The first batch of young goldfinches arrived today. Ordinarily I'd have feeders full of sunflower seeds for them but the advice from all the bird charities is to not do so this year to try to curb the spread trichomonosis. They'll have to make do with dandelions and nipplewort gone to seed this Summer.

I decided I'd go orchid-hunting on Stretford Meadows. In part because I didn't want to miss them like I did the cuckoo pints in Cob Kiln Wood, in part because if I was specifically looking for orchids there'd probably be more birds about than usual. And so it came to pass.

(A quick confession here: I find the marsh orchids baffling, there's lots of variation and they hybridise like billy-o so my identifications are tentative. Having said that, there's no excuse for my misidentifying southern marsh orchids and thinking they were early purple orchids the other day. I've gone back and rectified the error in the blog post.)

Stretford Meadows 

A grey, gloomy and heavy sort of afternoon kept hinting at rain. The trees at the end of Newcroft Road were seething with birdsong. Even the house sparrows joined in. Blackbirds, dunnocks and wrens provided the bulk of the chorus with support from blackcaps and chiffchaffs. For once the robins were silent. Out on the meadows every substantial bramble patch and many of the hawthorn bushes had a singing whitethroat. Goldfinches and greenfinches gamboled about when they weren't singing from saplings, song thrushes duelled from young oak trees, reed buntings from stands of great willowherb, chiffchaffs and blackbirds from the trees by the cricket ground and dunnocks from the bits of willow scrub at the edges. Woodpigeons and magpies clattered about, parakeets screeched from the treetops, jackdaws and carrions crows flew overhead, a couple of swallows zipped by, a heron flew low across the corner by the stables, a couple of mallards low over the cricket pitch. It was the busiest I've seen here for ages.

Marsh thistle

Common vetch

Southern marsh orchid

And so I looked for orchids. The Southern marsh orchids were plentiful, though mostly poking through in the depths of grasses, willowherbs or goldenrod. Here and there I found what I think are early marsh orchids, the concrete cap on the municipal tip underneath all this dampish earth would probably provide the right conditions. Then there were a lot that were best described as "almost certainly Southern marsh orchids" with variations in markings and shapes of the lower lips of the flowers. Bafflement abounded.

?Southern marsh orchid

?Early marsh orchid

Southern marsh orchid

I went looking for twayblade up top, I've found them there a couple of times. Its probably a bit early but I thought this might be a good way of bumping into a singing lesser whitethroat. I had no luck in either case.

Incoming rain

A glance to the East saw a band of filthy weather heading this way, I decided not to walk headlong into it on my way into the Mersey Valley. There are plenty enough paths up top to be able to avoid retracing my footsteps on my way back to Newcroft Road. I bumped into more greenfinches, song thrushes and whitethroats. 

At this point I consoled myself that we can't have all this green without some rain.

The teeming rain, accompanied by bright sun and dramatic lighting effects, hit a hundred yards away from the car park. I'm not sure if the great spotted woodpecker in the trees was objecting violently to me or the rain. Rather than walking home in it I got the bus into Urmston, did a shop and got the train home.

Marshside

Shoveler ducklings and mum

I really wasn't sure what the weather was going to be like today so I spent a lot of time carrying my coat around. The pollen count was set to High so I set off for the coast in the hopes that a sea breeze would keep things manageable. I had errands to do first thing so I missed the easy connection for the Southport train, rather than muck about with hanging about for connections in Manchester and Bolton I got the Liverpool train and got the Northern Line up to Southport. It takes about the same time but none of the connections are more than ten minutes' wait and the trains to Southport are every fifteen minutes.

After a grey and gloomy morning I arrived at Marshside on a bright and sunny afternoon. House sparrows, starlings and goldfinches zipped about Marshside Road, there weren't many house martins about, they turned out to be hawking over the marshes.

The marshes were largely empty stretches of grass. A few Canada goose families were dotted about Sutton's Marsh, across the road there was hardly anything to be seen. Handfuls of lapwings and redshanks were about and an oystercatcher rummaged in the grass, and I could hear skylarks and meadow pipits, but nearly all the bird life was by or in the pools and creeks. Nearly all. Three spoonbills — an adult and two youngsters — lurked in the long grass on Sutton's Marsh near the junction with Marine Drive. I wouldn't have noticed them had one of the youngsters not been skittish and chased after a little egret. I have to say that "skittish" is not a word I would usually employ concerning spoonbills.

Spoonbills, adult (left) and two youngsters

I hadn't heard much birdsong on the walk down Marshside Road save a bit of twittering of goldfinches. It came as a relief to hear a sedge warbler quietly singing to itself in the bushes near the Junction Pool and a reed warbler in the drain by the opposite corner.

Redshanks, avocet and curlew sandpiper (centre)

Four curlew sandpipers had been reported on the Junction Pool and lo and behold, there they were. Three kept together in a group feeding besides redshanks and a couple of avocets. One kept wandering about, making me keep checking to make sure there weren't five of them after all. 

Avocet, redshanks and curlew sandpipers 

A Cetti's warbler sang from the drain as I walked over to Sandgrounders. I was keeping an eye out for bee orchids on the bank, they never seem to flower from the same place two years running. This time I found two plants flowering close together with a Southern marsh orchid in between them acting as a handy marker.

Bee orchid

Southern marsh orchid

Bee orchid

The black-headed gulls nesting on the pool were unsurprisingly noisy, clamouring whenever a herring gull passed by. Canada geese, mallards and tufted ducks dozed by the banks. It felt very much like we were already in the Midsummer quiet period.

Black-tailed godwit

The black-headed gulls on the island in front of Sandgrounders and the marsh beyond sounded busy but I couldn't see much in the way of youngsters, the grass already being tall enough to hide most of the adults. Lapwings and black-tailed godwits rummaged about, all the godwits looked to be non-breeding yearlings. The shovelers had been productive and one pair paraded their brood up and down in front of the hide.

Shoveler duck

Shoveler drake

Shoveler duck

Shoveler ducklings

The avocet chicks were striking out on their own but their parents would suddenly arrive on the scene if anything remotely threatening appeared on the horizon. That included the little ringed plover having a bath in the corner of the pool.

Canada geese, avocet chicks (the tiny white figures in the centre) and tufted duck

I spent a while watching the the young birds pottering about then I glanced at the time. The day's errands were not all done yet and it was time to move on. As very pleasant interludes go, this was a good one.

Pennington Flash

Little ringed plover

Another showers and sunshine day boded slightly better late afternoon so I took a roundabout route to Pennington Flash to avoid the blackest clouds of the afternoon and struck lucky with bouts of sunshine. It's nice when the trick works.

Ragged robin

Even though it's still only the beginning of June the walk in from St Helens Road was a lot quieter than on my last visit. Robins, like the titmice, tended to be noises in the shadows or hinted at by leaves moving against the wind. Blackbirds, blackcaps and wrens sang fitfully to put placeholders on territories while they got on with the business of feeding hungry mouths.

Bradshaw Leach Meadow

Pennington Flash 

The wind was strong so most of the waterfowl were keeping to the banksides, a raft of coots by the near bank and a herd of mute swans over the other side. A few mallards and Canada geese lurked by the car park, kettled into one area by the fencing that's been put along the flash in preparation for the Iron Man swimming competition. It's occasionally easy to forget this is a National Nature Reserve.

Little ringed plover 

The F.W.Horrocks Hide can be a cold and windy place at the best of times, if it's a cool and windy day you definitely feel it. The spit was in one of it's quiet moods, the usual congregation of cormorants, herring gulls and lesser black-backs loafed at the end, mallards dozed, a pair of lapwings supervised at least one chick, and a little ringed plover skittered about the waterside near the hide.

Little ringed plover 

The black-headed gulls on the raft at the end of the spit were very active and made plenty of noise but it wasn't possible to see how productive they might have been being.

It was such a quiet walk to the Tom Edmondson Hide that it came as a relief when a chiffchaff started singing. A reed warbler riffed quietly from the Kidney Pool opposite the hide as though singing to itself. The pools at the hide were quiet, pairs of coots fed youngsters, a couple of gadwalls and mallards pottered about in the reeds. A young heron fished from the reed margins but seemed to be mostly catching insects off the surface and the occasional leaf. It's a rough learning curve once they leave the nest.

The Kidney Pool 

At Ramsdales 

It was quietly busier at Ramsdales, with the occasional burst of song from the Cetti's warbler in the usual corner. Canada geese loafed on the islands while mallards and gadwalls dabbled along the channels. I was surprised to see a drake teal out in plain sight, the teal are in deep cover this time of year. I very rarely see teal ducklings until they're nearly full grown. Lapwings fussed about well away from where their chicks were foraging. One pair made a big fuss of a little ringed plover walking too close to them.

Pennington Flash 

I decided I'd walk round to Plank Lane for the bus into Leigh. Scanning the flash from the North, to a background of singing reed buntings and reed warblers, there was a line of a couple of dozen great crested grebes cruising by the end of the Horrocks spit. It was a very orderly queue, I couldn't work out what it was about. Swifts swarmed low over the flash, oddly I couldn't see any hirundines whatever. It seemed good hunting weather for sand martins, perhaps it's just too far away from their nesting grounds.

Walking between the rucks and the canal, the canal bank's on the right

Willow warblers sang in the scrub on the rucks. I listened in vain for any whitethroats.

Greylag and goslings

Mallards and greylags cruised about on the canal. The greylags had plenty of well-grown goslings in tow. In contrast, the Canada geese still had downy yellow goslings with them on the towpath. A drake mandarin duck pottered my way then steamed off in the other direction when the camera appeared.

The mandarin duck didn't want to know

As I was taking photos of the yellow waterlilies in the marina another family of goslings rushed over in the expectation of a free meal. I made my excuses and left for the bus stop.

Yellow water lily

Lazy day

Juvenile blue tit

I had such plans for the day, turned over and fell asleep. The dawn choruses had caught up with me. I got up, got an early lunch and made every effort at going out for a walk save actually doing anything that might result in my going for a walk. I took the hint. I needed a reading day.

Juvenile blue tit

The blue tits pitched camp in the back garden, and with them came a revelation: I thought there were three youngsters in the brood, it turns out to be five or six. The adults are looking a little less frazzled than they have been, leaving the youngsters to their own devices most of the time. 

Dunnock

House sparrow

I've not seen a lot of the spadgers, they're making their views known on the double crime of hacking back the rambling rose and not filling up the seed feeders. They're still quietly sidling in to demolish the suet blocks, though.

Juvenile house sparrow

Female house sparrow

Come the evening the weather, though still windy, set to fairer than it had been most of the day so I decided I'd get the bus into Flixton and have a walk round Wellacre Country Park in what passes for the golden hour in heavy dark cloud, to see if I could pick up any bats or the barn owls I keep being told about on Green Hill.

Luckily, I realised that I'd left the binoculars, camera and bat detector at home just before the bus arrived. My subconscious wasn't even being subtle about it. I took the hint.

A walk along the Irwell

Canada geese and cormorant 

The young blue tits in the back garden are gaining in confidence, a couple are striking out on their own. The usual pattern is that after a few weeks at least one will start tagging along with a troupe of spadgers and that'll see them through the Winter. The robin had the first hour of the dawn chorus to itself then kept quiet most the rest of the morning. The blackbird was unusually late and kept singing on and off throughout lunchtime. The reason for the latter turned out to be an interloper, a male who stationed himself on the garden fence whenever he wasn't provocatively hunting for worms on next door's lawn. Even the female blackbird came out to protest about that.

It was another sunshine and showers day. I played bus station bingo at the Trafford Centre and got off the 52 at Kersal Wetlands.

It became a sunny afternoon. Sand martins hawked and swooped low over the river. A few drake mallards dabbled about the far bank, a pastoral idyll ruined when one hapless drake evidently said or did the wrong thing and was gang-raped by the others. Mallards are not gentle lovers at the best of times but even so I was rather shocked by this. Not as much as the victim, which spent the next five minutes rearranging its plumage before joining the others who were pottering about as if nothing had happened. It's never a good idea to look too hard at mallards in the breeding season.

Kersal Wetlands 

Blackbirds, wrens and robins were doing the bulk of the singing in the hedgerows by the houses with assists from robins, blackcaps and goldfinches. I got out into the open, looked at the sweeping flowering meadows, thought of hayfever and decided to have a walk amongst the trees on the riverbank. But not before I'd noticed there were some orchids about.

Southern marsh orchid

River Irwell

The walk along the riverbank was full of dramatic lighting effects, the songs of blackbirds, chiffchaffs, robins, chaffinches and song thrushes filled the air and were punctuated by the raucous calls of gangs of carrion crows and ring-necked parakeets. On the river pairs of tufted ducks and mallards were rather a lot more decorously behaved than the hooligans downstream. Half a dozen Canada geese cruised lazily upstream past a loafing cormorant. A couple more cormorants flew overhead. Jackdaws fussed in the trees on the far bank and woodpigeons clattered about in treetops.

Walking by the riverbank 

The titmice were in stealth mode, and no wonder as the blue tits, great tits and long-tailed tits all had youngsters in tow and the magpies were out in force.

Grey wagtail 
I'll not win any prizes with it but I'm glad I got a photo of this bird flycatching.

I checked out the shoals and shingles on the bends of the river looking for grey wagtails and soon found a family of them. One was using a mid-stream rock as a launching pad for flycatching sallies and had a pretty impressive strike rate, nearly every time it came back with an insect in its beak. A mayfly and, I think, an alder fly were amongst the bag.

One of the shingle beaches on the river

It had become warm and sunny, as long as you were out of the cool breeze, and the butterflies came out to play. Large whites and orange-tips fluttered about the sweet rocket on the bank, peacocks and speckled woods amongst the nettles and rank grass between the trees. Give it a month or so and this will all be invisible behind pink masses of Himalayan balsam. I noticed that every giant hogweed along the bank had been doused generously with weedkiller.

Spot the parakeet
If ring-necked parakeets could Keep quiet for longer than half a second they'd be impossible to find.

Ring-necked parakeet

Giddy with swarms of sand martins and grey wagtails bouncing along the far bank I found myself actively looking for dippers and kingfishers. I'm old enough to remember the Irwell being declared biologically dead. How times change. I didn't find any dippers or kingfishers, though. 

Walking by the river

As the river turned its sharpest bend willow warblers sang in the sallows and white poplars. I don't know why this is the point where they take over from the chiffchaffs, there were chiffchaffs singing from the woods on the opposite bank. The path is roped off here as the trees have adopted perilous angles in an effort to race the bank into the river. I could have ducked under the rope and carried on but I didn't want it to be this week that is be crushed by a tree. I headed inland and up the bank to the circular walk around the wetlands.

Kersal Wetlands, Manchester city centre in the background 

Down in the lake pairs of coots fed unlovely bald and gawky chicks, quietly steering them away from any herons that were lurking about on the islands. Canada geese and their goslings, similarly, preferred the company of people to the herons. I found just the one dabchick and I was frankly surprised to see that one out in the open this time of year.

Looking downstream from the bridge, including Canada geese 

I walked round to the bridge over to Kersal Dale. I'd have liked to have carried on walking upstream but the riverside paths peter out here for a stretch and I wasn't in the mood for working my way round to the back of Salford Sports Village and Agecroft Cemetery. I'd be better off picking up the 66 from Eccles sometime and picking up the walk from Drinkwater Park. Much better, then, to cross over and walk back downstream through Kersal Dale.

Kersal Dale 

Community blue damselfly 

Blackbirds, blackcaps, chiffchaffs, robins, chaffinches and a song thrush made themselves heard over parakeets, crows and magpies. A treecreeper quietly told me to move along as I paused by its tree to take photos of common blue damselflies. A little further along the Himalayan balsams were alive with banded demoiselles. 

Female banded damselfly 

The male damselflies were keeping a low profile when they weren't chasing the ladies.

Swifts hawked high over the meadows, sand martins hawked low over the river. I reached a bench at a bend and sat down to scan over the shingles on the river, jocularly reminding myself I was looking for dippers and kingfishers. Mallards drifted downstream. Grey wagtails and robins flitted about. Blackbirds came down for a drink and song thrushes chased each other over the river. A kingfisher flew upstream. I didn't have time to grab my camera and it would have been a lousy photo anyway so I just enjoyed the moment as it flew by and shot upstream.

River Irwell 

I forget that on this side of the river the banks are steep and ofttimes muddy. Wrens and blackbirds churred me on my way and a family of great tits blew raspberries as I passed them along one of the several flights of steps. My knees and wind both needed the exercise after a fairly lazy week and both had a grumble about it.

Kersal Dale 

I got up to Bury New Road, looked at the time and decided to head off home, getting the bus into Manchester. Given its urban setting I'm always surprised how productive this walk is. I should know by now.