Stretford

Rye Bank Fields

Another warm dozy day in the garden. There's been a lot of foraging activity by the sparrows, they're doing a grand job of clearing the rosebuds of greenfly. The dunnock and the coal tit are singing again and the great tits and blue tits are looking a bit tatty and frazzled. I'm hoping this all means nests are being productive.

The first couple of young jackdaws have joined their parents on the school playing field. I'm still waiting for any young woodpigeons to turn up. The grown-ups have been at it like knives in the trees on the embankment.

I decided I'd have a teatime stroll through Stretford via Moss Park and Victoria Park and then on to Longford Park and Rye Bank Fields. The parks were busy, as would be expected on a warm sunny Sunday. The highlights were a nuthatch working its way down a sycamore in Victoria Park and a great spotted woodpecker in Longford Park.

Any hopes of catching up with Rye Bank Fields were thwarted by all the entrances being fenced off so the university which owns the land can do "investigations" prior to its continuing to be dug up for a housing development. A chiffchaff in one of the boundary trees was the only warbler of the day.

Magpies

Juvenile magpie

The magpies have successfully raised a couple of young. After all the soap opera with the carrion crows, rooks and jackdaws in the tree down the road they'd given up on refurbishing the nest they've been using the past couple of years. Instead they waited until the pear tree next to it was in full leaf and they moved in and refurbished a nest that had been abandoned about five years ago. The youngsters have been clattering round the trees at the bottom of the garden for the past couple of days, today they were allowed to forage unsupervised. Which mostly involved rummaging around the bases of the blackcurrants, throwing sticks around the path and not noticing the pile of mealworms I put out on one of the feeder trays.

Juvenile magpie

And because we can't have too many goldfinches…

Goldfinch

Local patch

Coal tit

Another warm, dozy day in the garden, the only bit of news being the reappearance of one of the coal tits at the feeders.

I had an evening stroll around the local patch. Blackbirds and song thrushes foraged in the nettles along the footpath, a few more were singing from the trees in the waste ground. A couple of the whitethroats were defending territories in their bramble patches and the usual blackcaps and chiffchaffs were holding forth.

• Blackbird 8, 3 singing
• Blackcap 3 singing
• Carrion Crow 2
• Chaffinch 3, 2 singing
• Chiffchaff 2 singing
• Dunnock 1 singing
• Feral Pigeon 23
• Goldfinch 2
• Great Tit 1
• Greenfinch 1
• House Sparrow 6
• Jackdaw 1
• Lesser Black-backed Gull 4 overhead
• Long-tailed Tit 8, 6 young
• Magpie 6
• Robin 3, 1 singing
• Song Thrush 3, 1 singing
• Starling 6
• Whitethroat 2 singing
• Woodpigeon 10
• Wren 6 singing

The map below confirms how small this patch is. The northern boundary is the pale grey line running left to right, the old Trafford Park freight line. The southern boundary is the dark line across the picture, the boundary fence to the United Utilities land between the school and the waste ground. The grey line running up the right-hand side of the picture is the footpath between Old Hall Road and St Modwen's Road.

The remnants of the old cornfields at Barton Clough

Mersey Valley

Buzzard, Stretford Meadows

It was a fairly lazy day in the garden with birds quietly popping in and out to feed or sing from the sycamores on the railway embankment but no  dramas or crowd scenes. A day typified by the pair of collared doves dozing off a warm mid-afternoon in the cherry tree.

Collared doves

By teatime I eventually decided this wouldn't do, I should shift myself and get a bit of exercise. So I toddled down to Stretford Meadows. I decided to take the paths closest to the cricket pitch this time as this is where most of the reports of the feeding pair of lesser whitethroats have been coming from. I also wanted to see if I could get to see the pheasant I keep hearing calling from round here. I heard the pheasant but we were obviously circling round each other because a couple of minutes after I heard it calling immediately in front of me it was calling from behind me. I decided it wasn't worth turning the walk into a Roadrunner cartoon and gave up on it. I had very slightly more luck with the lesser whitethroats: a couple of calls from one of the bramble bushes and a brief and entirely unsatisfactory sighting as a male flew from a clump of comfrey into the depths of a goat willow then disappeared God knows where.

In contrast, common whitethroats, blackcaps and chiffchaffs were bounding all over the shop, most of them carrying a beakful of catterpillars or flies.There was a lot of singing, too, with the warblers being joined by reed buntings, dunnocks and wrens and every copse of trees had its resident song thrush belting out its song. No willow warblers today but they seem to be confined to the area around the horse paddocks at the end of Newcombe Road.

My first orchids of the year — early purple orchids, I think — were scattered around where the grass and nettles were thin and spindly.

Early purple orchid, Stretford Meadows

A large crow flying north high over the paddocks didn't look right and on inspection turned out to be a second calendar year raven, big and heavy-beaked but still beardless. A shape lumbering out of the trees just after the cricket ground turned out to be a buzzard. Once it emerged from the trees it slowly circled up then drifted over in the rough direction of Trafford Park. A partial moult and worn old feathers made it look a bit tatty round the edges but I think this is the same bird I see every so often at Barton Clough.

Sunbathing blackbird, Stretford Meadows

A bit further along I spent a few minutes watching a male blackbird sunning itself on the dusty path ahead of me. I waited until it had moved on before continuing. Not very long after I heard a couple of blackbird alarm calls and glancing up I saw a male sparrowhawk soaring overhead.

The plan had been just to have a stroll round the meadows but I didn't fancy walking back home from the top corner through the housing estate so decided to join the path running by Kickety Brook then through Stretford Ees and go home via the town centre.

Stretford Ees was a lot busier than the meadows had been. Even so, on a whim, I decided to carry on down to the river. The grassy meadows either side of the path were busy with feeding house sparrows and reed buntings. I don't know why, it's always nice to see a lot of reed buntings in one place. A couple of young moorhens were feeding on the moss covering the shallow pool at the end of the brook.

Young moorhen, Stretford Ees

Joining the path to the river I was scouring the waterside for wagtails of one sort or another when my eye was taken by something very dark and very bright. I don't recall ever seeing a banded demoiselle before. A very handsome beast.

Banded demoiselle, River Mersey by Stretford Ees

Past Turn Moss, which was littered with family groups sitting and enjoying the sun a good distance apart from each other, aside from the group in the corner having a barbecue who seemed to have decided we're back to business as usual. It sounds like the parakeets here have successfully reared some youngsters, there were a lot of raucous begging calls coming from the ash trees.

Away from the river Chorlton Ees was much quieter as far as people were concerned, a lot louder as far as robins, blackcaps and song thrushes were concerned. The chiffchaffs were quieter and were usually carrying too much in their beaks to be  much vocal. A jay by the little hidden pool was uncharacteristically quiet: I only noticed it because its claws made a bit of dry bark rustle as it moved along a branch.

I cut through Hardy Farm and then through Ivy Green, where a family of jays were making a blood-curdling racket and my first chaffinch of the day was singing. From there on to Edge Lane and back home through Stretford.

Local patch

Whitethroat, Barton Clough

I had a teatime stroll around the local patch, in truth because I was more awake at dawn than I was at lunchtime. It was pretty quiet in the park on the way in, possibly because it was more full of people than I've seen it this year. There was only me on the waste ground, well me and a bunch of singing warblers.

Barton Clough
(The deliberate use of the wide angle lens to mislead!)

Going back through the park on my way home a small family of blue tits, including four youngsters, flitted between one of the rowans and a maple. A couple of swifts over the park and three more overhead as I walked past the station made me feel slightly better about them.

• Blackbird 11, 5 singing
• Blackcap 4, 3 singing
• Blue Tit 8, 4 youngsters
• Chiffchaff 2 singing
• Dunnock 4 singing
• Feral Pigeon 13
• Goldfinch 3, 1 singing
• Greenfinch 1 singing
• House Sparrow 7
• Lesser Black-backed Gull 6 overhead
• Magpie 9
• Robin 7, 4 singing
• Song Thrush 1 singing
• Starling 1
• Swift 2
• Whitethroat 3 singing
• Woodpigeon 13
• Wren 8 singing

Home thoughts

Goldfinch

With it being a bright sunny May Bank Holiday and all I thought I'd best not walk abroad, most anywhere within walking distance would be crowded. I've started planning the first walks I want to be doing when things start to ease up slightly (I think the political events of the past couple of weekends may have knocked that back a bit). I'll be waiting for the initial rush to Martin Mere and Leighton Moss to die down before venturing that way. Pennington Flash and Elton Reservoir are enticing but understandably busy. Chat Moss is the most likely first port of call, possibly the Outwood Trail in Radcliffe next. If things settle safely Keg Wood and Marshside may be the next phase. Meanwhile I'll stick to a three mile-ish radius.

I know it's still only May but  I'm starting to worry about our local swifts. The first arrived at the end of April but there hasn't been many. The most I've seen at any one time this year has been five, most days if I see any at all it's just been a single bird. It could be that the long spell of dry weather has limited the number of low-flying midges and the like so the birds are flying too high to be readily seen.

The big flock of starlings has moved on to the little field behind the "new" houses down the road (they were built thirty years ago on most of a field that used to be part of Lewis' warehouse property). There are a couple of young jackdaws calling from one of the chimneys a couple of doors down. For the first time in a couple of weeks there's been more than one rook on the school playing field: five adults arrived in an untidy fashion, squabbled a bit then settled down to feeding.

In the garden the great tits are the latest to demonstrate their productivity. A single youngster visited accompanied by the male of the pair this afternoon and had a go at picking peanuts out of the feeder. I've not seen the young goldfinch for a couple of days even though a few adults are in and out of the garden all day.

Goldfinch

Stretford

Stretford Meadows

I had a teatime wander over Stretford Meadows. I was hoping to get a proper look at the lesser whitethroat that's been making itself known this past couple of weeks. I heard a short burst of singing earlier this week but I was hoping to do better. Most of this week's reported sightings have been on the East side of the meadows past the cricket pitch so I took a few of the paths over on that side then walked down the Eastern boundary to Kickety Brook.

It was still windy when I started the walk but halfway across the wind dropped and the warblers started singing. Plenty of chiffchaffs and blackcaps in the trees and half a dozen whitethroats seemed to be holding territories in bramble patches. Jackdaws and ring-necked parakeets were making a lot of noise about the tops of the trees. Out in the open there were small family parties of magpies and reed buntings sang from hawthorn bushes.

Three quarters of the way across, where four of the rough paths meet the metalled path, I could hear the call of a lesser whitethroat (I'm not a natural expert on this, I'd listened to a few recordings on Xeno-Canto before I came out). I wandered over to the patch the call was coming from, a typically messy mixture of brambles and great willowherb, and had a nosy round. I could only see a male dunnock and a blue tit but I decided to stick with it: more than once I've given up trying to find a lesser whitethroat only to have one pop up, pose for the camera that I'd just put back in the bag then skittle off again. Patience is a virtue and virtue is its own reward, so I'll just have to try another day.

Phyllobius pomaceus

There were a couple of unexpected treats. The first came early on, a beautiful metallic turquoise beetle on a patch of nettles. How have I spent all these years knee-deep in nettles without knowing the nettle weevil is such a handsome devil?

The second surprise was at the opposite end of the meadows, a singing linnet in one of the hawthorns on the margin. Easy to hear, hard work to find in the foliage, a site first for me.

Thence on to Stretford Ees, with a juvenile great spotted woodpecker and a jay along the way, and back through the town centre and home.

Local patch

House sparrows

The male sparrows are escorting the fledglings to the feeding station. I've got dried mealworms and sunflower seeds on the go, the spadgers seem to be preferring the seeds at the moment. At some stage the starlings will discover the mealworms but at the moment they're busy working their way through the leatherjackets on the school field. I counted fifty this lunchtime, the rest turned out to be taking advantage of the playground down the road being deserted.

Had a wander round my local patch early afternoon. The conditions were bad for birdwatching: lovely and sunny but the strong wind was keeping everything hunkered down. Between the howling of the wind through the trees and the amount of leaves blowing about I had my work cut out hearing or seeing very much. A couple of the whitethroats popped their heads above the brambles and the chiffchaff in the copse behind the school tried to make itself heard.

Whitethroat, Barton Clough

Back home I noticed an odd shape in the cherry tree. It turned out to be the first of this year's collared dove squabs.

Collared dove squab

Starlings

The local starlings are playing a blinder this Spring. There were seventy of them — adults and youngsters — feeding on the school playing field across the road. This is easily twice the productivity of recent years.

Feeding time

Otherwise fairly quiet. A few more young spadgers in the garden the only item of note today.

Flixton

Walking from Dutton's Pond to Jack Lane

It occurred to me that Flixton's only as far away as Sale Water Park so I decided to go and have an explore of the fields and woods I've puzzled over as the train travelled between Flixton and Irlam. It would give me the opportunity to get a few more oddly-composed photographs of where a warbler was a moment ago.

First stop was Dutton's Pond, which was modestly busy but that's only to be expected as it was lunchtime and it's right next to the housing estate. Everyone was being sensible so no worries. The trees along the paths were thick with blackcaps, chiffchaffs and robins. A dozen mallard on the pond were accompanied by seven ducklings and a pair of Canada geese had six goslings.

Walking down the lane towards Jack Lane the blackcaps and chiffchaffs gave way to whitethroats as the country became more open. A great spotted woodpecker flew from one of the hawthorns in one of the fields over towards Dutton's Pond.

Arriving at what I discovered was Jack Lane Local Nature Reserve (a thickly tree-lined lozenge filled with reeds and yellow flag) the first of two reed warblers was singing near the path. From here on the path was very quiet, once I passed Jack Lane I only met one person, twice. I scanned the air over the paddocks in the vain hopes of seeing the first swallows of the day. I generally assume that every field of horses always has a flock of swallows but this year I'm having to revise this.

The path got a lot rougher once I got to the corner where it meets the Ship Canal and runs along the margin towards Irlam Locks. My first gadwall for a couple of months, a female, was on the canal just here. Four cormorants flew over and half a dozen mallard loafed about on the Irlam side of the canal.

Black-headed gulls and oystercatcher, Flixton water treatment works

At this point the path disappears completely and you find yourself walking along the boundary wall of the canal. Just after this you get a close view of the water treatment works. A few dozen black-headed gulls were joined by an adult herring gull, a couple of oystercatchers and fifty or sixty starlings. I was reminded of the latrine orderly's line in Spike Milligan's war memoirs: "It may be shit to you but to me it's bread and butter."

And then I got to the end of the path. If you look at a map it looks like the path meets the beginning of Irlam Road and you can carry on down towards Town Gate and the Millennium Nature Reserve. In fact there's a big metal fence with spikes on top in the way. So I had to turn back and retrace my steps back to Jack Lane. This turned out to be good news as I was just getting to the bit where I was walking the wall when a male peregrine barrelled low along the canal and over the locks. I also got the first hirundine of the day: a single sand martin.

Walking down Jack Lane my world view was restored a little by the appearance of a couple of swallows over one of the paddocks. Then I encountered the one and only sour note of the day: a couple and their brood, all on bikes, decided to block the road as they decided which path they were going to take. I waited to let them make their minds up then spent the next hundred yards having them cycling past to and fro as they all decided to go off in different directions and had to be shepherded back to mummy and daddy then mummy and daddy went in different directions then… well, as you can imagine I was glad to see the back of them. Everyone else I encountered, walkers, cyclists and fishermen, were brilliant.

Anyway, I took the footpath across a field full of magpies and woodpigeons and rejoined the path to Sutton's Pond. At the end instead of turning left to the pond I turned right, walked under the little railway bridge and carried on down to Mersey View and Carrington Road. Taking a bit of a punt I spent five minutes scanning the river from the bridge at the top of Flixton Road (what we used to call "the mile road" because it's long, open and dead straight). I was rewarded by a fine male grey wagtail feeding in the deep shadows of a large willow tree's roots.

All in all a very nice walk, and very rewarding too.

Stretford

Stretford Meadows

An afternoon stroll around Stretford Meadows and Stretford Ees, the weather started overcast and muggy then cleared and brightened up. Chiffchaffs, blackcaps, wrens and a couple of willow warblers sang in the trees. Out in the open areas whitethroats and reed buntings sang from the scrub and bushes. On the East side, approaching Kickety Brook, a few rattling snatches of song from a lesser whitethroat could be heard struggling to compete with the whitethroats in the hawthorns and the sound of the traffic on the motorway. I couldn't find it, it was somewhere in a clump of elder bushes behind the hawthorns.

I was struck again by the absence of skylarks along our stretch of the Mersey Valley. When I was a kid there were always skylarks singing over the field behind the school (the remnants of which are my local birdwatching patch) and even the field next to Old Trafford Cricket Ground which was used as a football pitch by the grammar school had a pair. These days nothing,

There's a large element of luck in this birdwatching lark. If I hadn't glanced over the motorway and wondered why that distant plane looked a bit funny I wouldn't have spotted the buzzard flying over towards Urmston Meadows. And if I hadn't had a look round asking myself why there weren't any swallows I wouldn't have spotted the raven flying overhead.

Local patch

A young robin came into the garden for a lunchtime visit. Judging by the adroit way it tackled the fat on the giant pine cone it's been in before and I've missed it. There are a few more baby sparrows around, too, and it sounds like we'll be knee-deep in new starlings any day now.

Maple, Lostock Park

Had an afternoon stroll round the local patch, much relieved that here, at least, people are still behaving as if social distancing is a necessary evil. Birdwise it was mostly quiet, too, with most of the singing birds limiting themselves to a couple of bursts just to mark the territory in between being busy with other things. The whitethroats were in full song. There are four territories: one by the footpath to St Modwen Road, one centred around the big apple tree, one in the two bramble paces either side of the open space behind the copse, and one somewhere on St Modwen Road itself. No buzzard today but the female kestrel spent five minutes hovering over the far end of the ground before moving on towards the Trafford Centre.

This afternoon's tally:

• Blackbird 12, 5 singing 
• Blackcap 4 singing
• Blue Tit 3 
• Carrion Crow 2 
• Chaffinch 2, 1 singing 
• Chiffchaff 3, 2 singing
• Dunnock 3, 2 singing
• Feral Pigeon 21
• Goldfinch 9, 3 singing
• House Sparrow 11 
• Kestrel 1 
• Lesser Black-backed Gull 3 overhead
• Long-tailed Tit 2 
• Magpie 15 
• Robin 6, 4 singing
• Starling 3 
• Swift 3 
• Whitethroat 5, 4 singing
• Woodpigeon 6, 1 singing
• Wren 5 singing

More home thoughts

Juvenile goldfinch

I've got to admit that my visits to Urmston Meadows and Sale Water Park have put the wind up me a bit: the number of people who were making no effort whatever at social distancing —, including too many of the cyclists and joggers — didn't feel safe in the prevailing circumstances. As a palliative I've ordered some proper face masks as an upgrade to my home-made Lone Ranger affairs.

Whatever other lessons are to be learned from the pandemic it's painfully obvious that our urban and suburban public spaces are inadequate for the needs of a citizenry with nowhere else to go.

The first of the baby goldfinches has arrived in the garden. It's learned that the feeders are the place to go for food but it had to have a few attempts before it finally picked out a sunflower seed. Unusually there weren't any supervising adults with it.

The song thrush that was a feature of the dawn chorus earlier this Spring has been quiet the past couple of weeks but it came back for a short burst of song this morning. The blackcap that took over its choral duties has gone quiet, however, limiting its singing to the early morning and late afternoon.

Male house sparrow

Male house sparrows

Just as I was counting the woodpigeons on the field across the road (a measly eleven this time) seven ring-necked parakeets flew overhead towards the meadows.

Mersey Valley

Jay, Jackson's Boat

The plan had been to walk into Stretford to get some bird food. The house sparrows and goldfinches have been giving the feeders some hammer this week. After my saying I've not seen the great tits for a bit both the pair came in this lunchtime. I've done this a few times now, saying I've not seen anything awhile then having them turn up the day after writing. This might be the time to point out that I can't remember when I last saw a firecrest in the garden. (I've never seen a firecrest in the garden but if I'm going to test how the magic spell works I may as well aim high).

Anyway, the plan had been to walk into Stretford to get some bird food but on the way I decided to carry on to Stretford Ees and once I was there I decided to carry on over to Sale Water Park and I ended up walking to Jackson's Boat and following the river down alongside Chorlton Ees and back home via Turn Moss, the cemetery and Humphrey Park allotments.

It was a busy afternoon with lots of family parties, joggers and cyclists. Even so there were plenty of birds about. Every substantial group of trees had a wren, blackbird, robin and/or song thrush singing in it. Chiffchaffs and blackcaps were quieter than on the last visit but whitethroats were conspicuous in the hawthorns along Stretford Ees and Chorlton Ees.

Great crested grebe and young, Sale Water Park

The coot families on Sale Water Park seem to still be thriving and the mallard ducklings are well grown, as were the baby great crested grebes hitching a lift on their mother's back. The ginormous leather carp that were breaking the water (well away from the anglers at the other end of the lake!) posed no threat to any of them.

Broad Ees Dole was a lot quieter this visit. The lapwings and the pair of tufted duck were still about, together with a couple of herons and a small group of mallard. Just the one reed warbler singing from the water's edge. Good to see plenty of common blue damselflies about.

I walked up the main path from the café to Jackson's boat. The feeding station by the café's been removed so there was no incentive to hang about in the hopes of seeing a willow tit or two, I was better off walking down and keeping my ears open. Which I did, entirely unsuccessfully as it turned out. Still, no matter: as a consolation a very obliging jay came down to the brook for a drink then offered a selection of winsome poses at a ridiculously close range.

Jay, Jackson's Boat

 At Jackson's Boat the parakeets were still in and out of the nest in the telegraph pole. The first swifts of the day were hawking quite high up while a small flock of swallows flew over the river. Most of the singing was coming from a couple of blackbirds and two or three greenfinches (two bursts of song from behind the apple trees may have been two birds but I couldn't confirm it).

Blackbird, Jackson's Boat

I walked down the river back towards Stretford. Raptors of any kind had been notable by their absence. The first and only buzzard of the day was badgered away from its perch in one of the trees on the south bank by the water park by a couple of crows that got bored of the game immediately the buzzard took flight. Reed buntings were singing in the little glades away from the paths and a great spotted woodpecker flew into one of the big sallows.

All in all a nice walk but I'm going to have to find some quieter places to go, at times the social distancing isn't clever.

Walking distance only

I've been reviewing my birdwatching for the past eight weeks. I've been out for just as many walks as last year and seen 68 species as opposed to 134. Ah well, seeing the sea again is something to look forward to.

Site visits 17/03/20 to 13/05/20

Site visits 17/03/19 to 13/05/19

Urmston Meadows

Bullfinch

A nice lunchtime surprise was a pair of bullfinches on the sunflower seed feeder. I don't usually get them in this time of year.

I've evidently been underestimating the local starling population: there were nearly forty adults feeding on the school playing field this morning.

It occurred to me today that it's been a very long time since I last had a walk round Urmston Meadows, twenty-odd years in fact, and there's no good reason as it's no longer a walk than down to Sale Water Park. So I toddled off down for an afternoon stroll. I'd hoped the weather would be putting people off but it cleared up a bit so there were plenty of families out for a walk, luckily not so many as to cause any upset once I'd gone along a bit.

River Mersey, Urmston Meadows

I walked down the lane past Urmston Cemetery then took the path over Old Eea Brook and down to the river. I was unreasonably surprised at how much all the trees have grown over the years and it took me a few minutes to get my bearings. There were good numbers of chaffinches and robins in the trees and a couple of chiffchaffs and a song thrush were singing lustily. A heron floated overhead and five ring-necked parakeets clamoured by over the ash trees.

Walking along a bit, away from the shingle point bar people were using as a play area, the landscape opened up a bit with a light scattering of young willows along the tops of the bank and a grassy area along the path. A couple of whitethroats were disputing a territory in the brambles on the opposite bank. A family of mallards — a pair with six ducklings — bobbed about in the meander just below the bank.

Here and there a willow bough fallen in the river acted as a filter, collecting sundry bits of detritus including an uncommon number of children's footballs. There was obviously more than that as a pair of grey wagtails and a pied wagtail were very busily rooting about in there. There were more pairs of both further along the river. It was sad to see so much Japanese knotweed about but most of it looked like it was struggling either with the weather or, judging by some of the leaves, someone's been sprinkling weedkiller about.

I got to the particularly tight meander that coincides with a dip in the path down to the river and saw my first swifts of the day, shortly followed by my first sand martins of the year (at last!), both hawking over the stretch of the river where a natural weir has formed.

Old Eea Brook

From here the path rises into a patch of woodland which I remembered as hawthorn scrub with ash and willow saplings that linnets used as singing posts. The linnets have moved on, replaced by wrens, robins and blackcaps. A couple of willow warblers sang, appropriately enough, from some willows and I eventually caught sight of and identified my first garden warbler of the year (does the bird have no identifying features? if yes, it's a garden warbler).

I soon got to the lane that runs from the cemetery round to Southgate, I needed to be back by teatime so I decided not to go down that way, instead going back to the cemetery then up the path past the stables and thence into Urmston.

There were plenty of swallows hawking over the paddocks and the hedgerows held blue tits, blackcaps and robins. As I passed the little brook where the path branches I disturbed a great spotted woodpecker.

From Urmston I went home via the allotments on Humphrey Lane and small noisy flocks of house sparrows and goldfinches.

Home thoughts

The garden was enlivened by the arrival of a few more young sparrows. I'll have to get some more seed feeders to meet the new demand, the squirrels wrecked the last ones I had on the feeder near the house. A couple of blue tits were on the pine cones with the sparrows and the robin. It's been a few days since I last saw the great tits and a couple of weeks since I last saw the coal tits, I hope it's because they're busy.

A variation on the theme of having a couple of lesser black-backs on the school playing field today, a lesser black-back and a herring gull giving every impression of being a pair. I've seen odd singles of herring gulls round here over the past few weeks but no pairs. I'll be keeping an eye out to see if these two come back.

Local patch

Barton Clough

The cat woke me early on in a state of excitement because she could hear geese overhead. I got excited because it wasn't the expected Canada geese, it was a small skein of pink-footed geese, possibly the last stragglers on the way back up to Iceland.

The garden is full of birdsong, but it's devilish hard to see most of the culprits. The male robin's started singing again, the great tits are quietly slipping in and out to the feeders and one of the blue tits makes a noisy performance of coming into the garden. Just the one young house sparrow seen so far, it's only a matter of time before they descend en masse and judging by the sounds in neighbours' eaves there'll be a few young starlings accompanying them.

The leaves have been hiding the nests in the trees along the road. I haven't seen much activity around them so assumed they'd both been abandoned. A dead baby jackdaw at the base of the alder made me look up as I was passing. A pair of jackdaws have taken over the crows' nest this time.

A walk around the local patch was rewarding. Birds singing in the park included four singing blackbirds, two blackcaps, two robins, three wrens and a chaffinch. Songsters in the waste ground included five blackbirds, two chiffchaffs, four blackcaps, two robins and five wrens. I couldn't work out whether there are three or four whitethroat territories, there were certainly four birds jostling round the brambles. While I was trying to make sense of this a buzzard quietly left the copse behind the school and made off towards Trafford Park, one of the carrion crows from the park joining it to escort it out on its way.

As I was leaving the park a ring-necked parakeet flow overhead towards the Trafford Centre. It's only a matter of time before they're local fixtures.

Mersey Valley

Juvenile ring-necked parakeet, Jackson's Boat

Business as usual in the garden. Lots of chirping and singing but now everything's in full leaf it's the devil's own job to do an accurate count. I reckon that sixty-odd starlings that descended on the garden a couple of months ago could disappear in an instant in those sycamores on the railway embankment. The sparrows are working hard saving the roses from greenfly and the goldfinches are stripping away the dandelion clocks. A low-flying pair of Canada geese were a surprising addition to the morning's viewing.

One of the house sparrows looking for aphids

Had an afternoon stroll into Stretford, through Stretford Ees to Sale Water Park, nipping through Sale Ees to Jackson's Boat, on to Hardy Farm and then back home.

Walking past the station towards the town centre it was good to see half a dozen swifts hawking around. A couple of dark shapes looked distinctly un-swiftlike. Eventually they drifted close enough for me to be sure they were a couple of buzzards. They were both distinctly darker than the usual ones I see round here, it took a while to be able to pick out the dark carpal patch on the underwing.

Walking down the road towards Hawthorn Road and Stretford Ees I was pleased to see three house martins swooping and singing and visiting last year's nests. I still haven't seen any around Stretford Mall and Victoria Park, they seem to be declining here over the past few years.

Stretford Ees was busy with walkers and rather busier with cyclists but even so blackcaps, chiffchaffs and blackbirds were well in song.

At Sale Water Park the only gulls were a couple of herring gulls. A couple of great crested grebes were out in the water while some moorhens and a few of family parties of coot were near the water's edge. Given coots' predilection for tough love it's amazing to see the size of the broods that survive. A couple of very vocal reed warblers did a good job of ignoring noisy spaniels. The first dragonfly of the year was a female common blue damselfly over the teal pool by Broad Ees Dole.

Coots, Sale Water Park

Two lapwings loafing on the island at Broad Ees Dole were my first for nearly two months. A pair of dabchicks were whinnying away in one corner of the pool while out in the open water there were a pair of tufted ducks and a goosander.

On a whim I decided to walk through Sale Ees to Jackson's Boat for a change. A pheasant was calling from the area that was coppiced last Winter. A little further on a kerfuffle announced the start of a fight between a magpie and a jay that had been a bit too close to the magpies' nest. My first whitethroat of the day was singing from one of the hawthorns on the approach to the pub. Walking over the bridge I found the ring-necked parakeets that have been nesting in the telegraph pole at Jackson's Boat have had two youngsters.

I debated carrying on to Chorlton Water Park but decided against, the paths were too busy to be enjoyable. So I walked through Hardy Farm and made my way home.

Stretford

Stretford Meadows

I had an afternoon stroll round Stretford Meadows today, going through into Stretford Ees then circling back to Stretford Mall for a fruitless attempt at a bit of shopping for my dad.

There were plenty of warblers about. Willow warblers and blackcaps were singing in the trees about the paddocks at the end of Newcroft Road and around Kickety Brook, where there were also a couple of chiffchaffs and a singing goldcrest. Out in the open country there were five singing whitethroats, together with half a dozen singing reed buntings. I thought I caught a grasshopper warbler singing but the combination of the sound of M60 traffic, a whitethroat and a wren made it difficult to pick out for sure and whatever it was went quiet so I can't be sure one way or another.

There were only a couple of swallows overhead today. No swifts and no house martins in Stretford town centre either. It's a sign of the strange times that I still haven't seen any sand martins, they're usually the first hirundines I find in Spring.

Local patch and Trafford Park

Mute swan, Bridgewater Canal, Trafford Park

A teatime walk in the hopes that paths wouldn't be busy, which worked a bit, just a couple of dozen cyclists (and they used their bells!) A wander round the local patch then down Bridgewater Way to the canal and down past the marina and into Stretford. Only three and a bit miles but I needed some exercise.

Just less than an hour round the local patch which was fairly quiet, unsurprising given the time of day and the business of the park.

• Blackbird 11, 5 singing
• Blackcap 2 singing
• Blue Tit 2
• Carrion Crow 2
• Chaffinch 1
• Chiffchaff 1 singing
• Cormorant 1 overhead
• Dunnock 2 singing
• Feral Pigeon 32
• Goldfinch 4, 1 singing
• Great Tit 1
• Greenfinch 1
• House Sparrow 7
• Lesser Black-backed Gull 4 overhead
• Long-tailed Tit 1
• Magpie 11
• Mistle Thrush 1
• Robin 2 singing
• Song Thrush 1 singing
• Starling 2
• Whitethroat 3 singing
• Woodpigeon 15, 2 singing
• Wren 5 singing

Walking down to the canal there were a few more blackcaps and chiffchaffs in the trees between the path and the logistics works. A jay very quietly working its way along the fence along the path had a family of long-tailed tits very perturbed but I didn't see any evidence of nest raiding.

There were pairs of Canada geese dotted along the canal. They were demonstrating a social distancing of sorts, a couple of loud scuffles and aggression displays showed how it was achieved. There was also a pair of mute swans and a few single drake mallards on the water. I could hear a kestrel loudly calling but I struggled to find it, the sparrowhawk that frightened the starlings at Stretford Marina was a lot easier to see.

This heron was catching forty winks on the bank opposite the Kellogg's factory.

It was good to see a few swifts and the first house martins of the year as I got to Stretford tram station.

Stretford Meadows

Sketch map: Stretford Meadows

Stretford Meadows is my nearest big open space. It's the site of the old municipal tip, capped and grassed over a couple of decades ago. The M60 forms the boundary on the West and South sides, the Northern boundary is formed by the houses along Urmston Lane and on the East by the Cherry Tree housing estate, the council recycling centre and the A56 Chester Road. There is one good path around the periphery running from the end of Newcroft Road down to the embankment to the M60 then running more or less dead East, meeting Kickety Brook near Chester Road, running under the road and into Stretford Ees by the Bridgewater Canal. There's a rough network of paths across the meadows ranging from the good one used by the inspection teams to the barely existent. The better ones are shown on the map. The 15, 18, 25, 245 and 255 buses run down Urmston Lane.

There are mature trees lining most of the boundaries of the meadows, thickest by the Newcroft Road end of the peripheral path and by Kickety Brook. Blackcaps, chiffchaffs and willow warblers are very vocal in these in Spring. The main body of the meadows is undulating damp open grassland dotted about with small hawthorns and willow bushes. This can seem a bit barren, save for small parties of magpies, but it's worth persevering with: in Summer there will be a few whitethroat territories and you may find a grasshopper warbler or a lesser whitethroat. There's quite often a pheasant kicking round the cricket club area and grey partridge are often reported but I've had no luck yet finding them. Look out for sedge warblers near the brook. There's nearly always at least one kestrel hunting the meadows and buzzards are common flyovers. Ring-necked parakeets and stock doves are also regular flyovers.

Stretford Meadows from the periphery path

Stretford Meadows

Kickety Brook